Getting started

This page takes you from a new trial to a backup that is monitored and an alert that reaches you. The longest wait is usually for the backup software to send its next report.

Start the trial

Sign up with your name, company, work email and a password of at least 8 characters. The trial runs for 14 days on Starter limits, which means up to 25 backup jobs. No credit card is required.

When you click Create account:

• You are signed in straight away.
• A workspace is created with you as its Owner. It is named after your company (or after you, if you left Company empty).
• A verification email goes to your work email. Open the link in it. Until you do, you can look around everything, but you cannot start monitoring a backup.

When the trial ends without a plan, the workspace is suspended and monitoring stops. Your data is kept. See Billing.

Set up your workspace

After sign-up you land on a short setup with three steps.

1. Set up your workspace. Enter the Workspace name, the First client name and a Timezone. A client is the business whose backups you watch; you can add more later. The timezone sets the dates on your digests and reports.
2. Secure your account. Turn on two-factor sign-in with an authenticator app, or choose Skip for now. You can do it later in Settings → Security.
3. Connect a backup. This shows the client address and waits for the first report (see below).

When you click Continue on the first step, BackupSentinel creates the client and an Email alert channel called "Team email" that sends to your own address. Skip for now saves the name and timezone and takes you to the dashboard without creating a client.

Point your backup software at the client address

Every client gets its own address when you create it, for example:

harbour-it-northwind-dental-3f9a1c2b7d4e8f60@ingest.backupsentinel.io

Set this address as a recipient of the report emails in that client's backup software. Pick your product under Which backup product do you use? to see its steps, or follow the full guide for it in Setup guides. If your product is not listed, read Other software.

Reports can be sent straight to the address or forwarded to it from a mailbox that already receives them. Client addresses explains how a report finds its backup when one client has several.

The first report

The Connect your first backup screen checks for new email every few seconds for 15 minutes. When a report arrives it shows "We received a report" with the Subject, From, how it was Read as (success, warning, failure or no result) and the Detected backup name.

• Click Start monitoring to create that backup. The email is assigned to it, so it gets its status from this first report, and every later report from that backup updates it.
• Click Not this one if the email is not a backup report. The screen waits for the next one.
• Click I'll do this later to go to the dashboard. Reports that arrive later wait in the Inbox, where Start monitoring does the same thing.

If you prefer to set the backup up before any report has arrived, use Add a backup by hand. A backup created that way is Waiting until its first report.

• HealthyHealthy: The last report came in and read as a success.
• WarningWarning: It finished, with skipped files or a partial run.
• FailedFailed: The report said it failed. Repeats count as a streak.
• WaitingWaiting: Set up, no report yet, so nothing is assumed.

Starting to monitor a backup counts towards your plan's job limit and needs a verified email.

Set how often each backup runs

A backup started from the setup screen expects a report Daily. If it runs more or less often, open the backup and change Expected every (hourly up to monthly). This interval decides when a quiet backup turns Missing, so it should cover the longest normal gap between two reports. Job statuses and missing reports has the exact timing.

Once a backup has at least five gaps between reports, its page suggests an interval based on the typical gap.

Choose where alerts go

The "Team email" channel from the setup sends alerts to you. To add Slack, Microsoft Teams, PagerDuty or another email address, go to Settings → Alert channels and click Add channel. Send test checks an Email, Slack or Teams channel straight away.

Without any active channel, problems only show in Needs attention, and Needs attention lists "No alert channel set up" once you have a backup. See Alerts and channels.

The setup guide on the Overview

Until setup is complete, the Overview shows Set up your first backup with seven steps that tick themselves:

1. Create your account
2. Verify your email
3. Add your first client
4. Send a backup report to the client's address
5. Start monitoring a backup
6. Add an alert channel
7. See your first successful backup

Each open step says what to do next and links to the right page. Take the tour walks through the main pages, and Hide puts the guide away.

Invite your team

Go to Settings → Members and click Invite member. You choose a role for each person:

• Admin: changes data and manages settings, alert channels, API keys, members, billing and exports.
• Member: changes data, for example acknowledges and resolves problems, adds clients and backups.
• Viewer: sees everything and changes nothing.

Invitations expire after 14 days. Team seats are unlimited on every plan. More in Team and security.

Turn on two-factor sign-in

Set up two-factor sign-in for your own account in Settings → Security with any authenticator app. You enter a 6-digit code after your password.

Owners and admins can also require it for everyone: switch on Enforce 2FA in the same section after enrolling yourself. Members who have not set it up are asked to before they can use the dashboard.

What to do next

• Add the rest of your clients and point each one's backup software at its own address.
• Check the Inbox for reports that did not find a backup, and start monitoring them.
• Work through Needs attention each morning. The workspace owner also gets a daily digest email at 07:00 workspace time.