Web UI Improvements

[azamserver]

Hi everyone!
I’m a new Duplicacy user that has a Personal Web GUI license. I would first like to start off by saying that I am loving Duplicacy. It has actually been perfect and has checked all my boxes for a cloud backup software. However, there are a few improvements that I believe could make the Web GUI even better. I have listed them all down below:

1. A Logout button. The first thing that really confused me is that there wasn’t a login button. I thought that it may have been hidden, but it actually doesn’t exist. In fact, if I login to Duplicacy on one device, any other device that accesses Duplicacy next does NOT need a password. This is a HUGE security risk, and it would be great if it could be fixed.
2. Longer Times In Backup Schedule. Uploading a backup every week not only seems like a waste of resources, but can also take up precious network bandwidth. I would strongly encourage that Duplicacy would allow to schedule a backup for at least a minimum of every month. This way server resources and network bandwidth can be saved.
3. An Easier “Delete Schedule” Button. To my surprise, there is actually no easy way to delete a schedule. When I searched though the forums, I actually realized that I needed to click the clock button and then click the delete button to delete a schedule. Not only is this very inefficient, but can also be exhausting to find for new users. I would recommend to put an “X” next to where the clock is, just like it is to delete a backup or storage volume.
4. An easier way to input our licenses. Just like the “Delete Schedule” button, there is actually no easy way to input our licenses. To input a license, you actually have to go to the Backup section of the Web GUI, click the word “Trial”, and only then can a license be inputted. In my opinion, I feel like putting an option to input your license in the “Setting” tab would be more obvious to new users. Again, this is my opinion, so please take it with a grain of salt.

I am very sorry if any of this advice has been said before or sounds rude, as I really don’t mean either. It’s just that there hasn’t been an update to Duplicacy’s Web GUI in a very long time, and I believe that these four additions would be a great place to start. Again, anyone viewing this can feel free to prove me wrong, and I will gladly accept defeat if there is sufficient evidence to do so.

So Duplicacy Developers, thanks for doing such a great job and keep up the good work, but please try to add these new additions ASAP (especially the logout button). Thanks and have a wonderful day!

[saspus]

@azamserver

Longer Times In Backup Schedule. Uploading a backup every week not only seems like a waste of resources, but can also take up precious network bandwidth. I would strongly encourage that Duplicacy would allow to schedule a backup for at least a minimum of every month. This way server resources and network bandwidth can be saved.

I strongly disagree with this. Backup is incremental. Doing it every 15 minutes does not consume more resources than doing it hourly or daily. This is a rather strange requirement. What is the usecase, can you elaborate? Why do you think making backup more often consumers more network bandwidth?

If data turnover rate is so high that daily backup results in significant traffic – you shoudl do backup more often, not less.

@azamserver

An Easier “Delete Schedule” Button. To my surprise, there is actually no easy way to delete a schedule. When I searched though the forums, I actually realized that I needed to click the clock button and then click the delete button to delete a schedule. Not only is this very inefficient, but can also be exhausting to find for new users. I would recommend to put an “X” next to where the clock is, just like it is to delete a backup or storage volume.

Making deleting something easy is a bad idea.

Deleting schedule from a configuration page is a pretty common UI pattern. It should not be easy to do. In fact, I’d argue, it should be equally difficult to delete backup or storage. This is not a common operation and it should not be in the way.

@azamserver

and I will gladly accept defeat if there is sufficient evidence to do so.

It’s not a battle, its a discussion

[azamserver]

Thanks so much for the quick response! I really do appreciate it!

In relation to data backups, what I was trying to say was that uploading a backup does take up network bandwidth while doing so. With my idea, the network bandwidth that is being used to upload data to your backup solution can now be available when needed, except once every month, instead of not being available weekly, if that made any sense. I am running a home server with an MC server that does local backups anyway, and I need whatever bandwidth I can get for it, so doing a local backup and a cloud backup every week would seem very useless. In my case scenario, doing a cloud backup every month makes more sense than doing it every week, but again this is my opinion, so please do take it with a grain of salt.

As for the delete schedule button, I 100% agree with your point, but instead of not adding the feature at all, I believe there is a way to prevent accidental deletions. Again, in my opinion, I believe that there should be an accessible way to delete backups (for example, an “X” button next to the clock), however, upon pushing it, a confirmation popup should pop-up asking the user again if the button press was accidental or done on purpose.

Again, these all are my options, so please take them with a grain of salt, and thanks for the reminder that this is a discussion .

[gchen]

@azamserver

A Logout button. The first thing that really confused me is that there wasn’t a login button. I thought that it may have been hidden, but it actually doesn’t exist. In fact, if I login to Duplicacy on one device, any other device that accesses Duplicacy next does NOT need a password. This is a HUGE security risk, and it would be great if it could be fixed.

The password you enter the first time the web GUI runs is meant to be used for encrypting storage credentials. It is not a login password. For that you’ll need to go to “Setting” and enter an Administration password.

@azamserver

Longer Times In Backup Schedule. Uploading a backup every week not only seems like a waste of resources, but can also take up precious network bandwidth. I would strongly encourage that Duplicacy would allow to schedule a backup for at least a minimum of every month. This way server resources and network bandwidth can be saved.

I’ll need to figure out a way to allow for monthly backups without overcrowding the interface.

@azamserver

An Easier “Delete Schedule” Button. To my surprise, there is actually no easy way to delete a schedule. When I searched though the forums, I actually realized that I needed to click the clock button and then click the delete button to delete a schedule. Not only is this very inefficient, but can also be exhausting to find for new users. I would recommend to put an “X” next to where the clock is, just like it is to delete a backup or storage volume.

On this one I agree with @saspus.

@azamserver

An easier way to input our licenses. Just like the “Delete Schedule” button, there is actually no easy way to input our licenses. To input a license, you actually have to go to the Backup section of the Web GUI, click the word “Trial”, and only then can a license be inputted. In my opinion, I feel like putting an option to input your license in the “Setting” tab would be more obvious to new users. Again, this is my opinion, so please take it with a grain of salt.

There are 2 reasons why the license only appears on the Backup page: 1) the backup job is the only job that requires a license, and all other jobs don’t, and 2) the Backup page was designed to support multiple remote computers with one license per computer, but that hasn’t been implemented in the current version.

[azamserver]

Thanks for the info on the administrative password.

Also, thanks so much for listening to the advice I gave about the backup schedule!

As for the easier delete schedule button, don’t you think a confirmation popup would suffice to prevent accidental deletions? I’m saying this because it was hard to find, and I only found it because of the forums.

As for the license input, just like the delete schedule button, it was very hard to find, and I only found it after looking on the forums. I just think putting it in settings would make it easier for new users to find. Again, that’s my opinion, and I totally understand your side on not wanting to put it there.

[angelperezpr]

well, I just found this old thread while looking only for an option to have monthly in the schedule like every single backup software I used before. The reason? (because I know someone will ask) simple, I am doing a local backup (less than an hour) then a cloud backup using the copy option to a storage in the country and a second copy to an out of country cloud location so it is taking over 11 days per backup (of course now at the beginning as in theory then should be only the files that have been modified) but instead of having me checking when the backup finish it wont be nice to have that automated? thats the purpose of scheduling no? I found very weird that duplicacy dont have that option when I have seen backup solutions to even once a year, will be that hard to implement?

[sevimo]

There should be no issues with long running copies of the live storage (one that continues to create new snapshots). So you may simply run your local snapshots daily, and continuously copy externally even if it takes several days. You likely won’t be able to use the most recent snapshots (the ones that were created after you started your copy) off the remote, but these will be picked up after the next copy cycle.