Backups and restore
Everything Mandala knows is in its data directory (ALMA_DATA_DIR, usually ~/.mandala), plus your Goethe vaults if you placed them elsewhere. Back up both.
Make a consistent backup
The record store is written continuously. Copy it while Mandala is stopped, or from a filesystem snapshot.
Stopped (simplest):
sudo systemctl stop mandala
tar -C ~ -czf /backups/mandala-$(date +%F).tar.gz .mandala
sudo systemctl start mandala
Stopping takes a few seconds: Mandala finishes what it is writing and releases its lock. Restarts are safe; interrupted work resumes.
Snapshot (no downtime): take a snapshot of the volume (ZFS, btrfs, LVM, or your VPS provider's snapshots), then copy from the snapshot.
Keep at least one copy off the machine, and encrypt it: the backup contains your credentials' master key and your private data.
What is in it
| Path | Holds | If lost |
|---|---|---|
dharma/ | Every record and its history; your accomplice's conversations and memory | Everything |
master.key | The key that decrypts stored credentials | Every API key and sign-in must be entered again |
vaults/ | Vaults created from Knowledge, and the Docs vault | Those documents (Docs is rebuilt from the release) |
Your Goethe vaults (ALMA_GOETHE_JULIEN_ROOT, agent roots) | Your documents and your accomplice's | Those documents |
vault-sync/ | Vault sync state | Rebuilt |
contracts/ | Contracts installed from the Workbench | Those contracts |
telegram.db, telegram-accounts/, whatsapp/ | Chat sessions and stored messages | You sign in again; older messages may not come back |
push/ | Notification keys | Devices must turn notifications on again |
comms/index.db | The Communications index (a cache) | Rebuilt from Gmail and chats |
Restore
sudo systemctl stop mandala
mv ~/.mandala ~/.mandala.broken
tar -C ~ -xzf /backups/mandala-2026-10-01.tar.gz
sudo systemctl start mandala
curl -s http://127.0.0.1:8787/health
Restore with the same or a newer Mandala version than the one that made the backup.
A second node is not a backup
A paired node holds a live copy and survives the loss of a machine, but a deletion syncs too. Keep dated backups as well.
Coming soon — backups set up automatically when Mandala installs itself on a VPS.