As the hosting operator, guide your customer through requesting a manual cluster snapshot from their active PD AWS DocumentDB service before planned application work. Confirm the correct database first, then allow AWS to finish creating the snapshot before relying on it.

Customer steps: request a manual snapshot

1. Open the intended customer service and confirm its database and region.
2. Open Snapshots from the service’s navigation.
3. Choose Take snapshot and read the confirmation.
4. Confirm once, then follow the request in Activity.
5. Return to Snapshots and check the new snapshot’s status and creation time.

A queued or accepted request is not proof of an available recovery point. Activity can show Done when AWS has accepted the snapshot operation; the snapshot can still be creating. Avoid requesting more copies while the original action is pending.

Distinguish manual and automated backups

DocumentDB listings can contain automated backups as well as manual snapshots. Automated retention and manual-snapshot storage are separate considerations. Manual snapshots can incur provider storage charges, so retain the copies the application needs rather than creating repeated copies to test a button.

An empty list can be a read failure or an incomplete list. Your hosting team should compare the original service, cluster and region with the recovery points in your AWS account before assuming no backup exists or requesting more copies.

Plan the recovery workflow

The customer snapshot page does not offer Restore or snapshot export. A cluster snapshot is a recovery point, not a downloadable database-data file. Read the DocumentDB recovery-planning guide before changing the original database; a snapshot is useful only when the administrator can restore and verify it. Keep any required recovery point intact.

See the PD AWS DocumentDB Blesta guide for related tasks, or explore PD AWS DocumentDB.