Sorry to blast off like that, now back to the agenda. The built-in WP export function which produces an XML file is one way to export your data, but I prefer a real database dump (like phpMyAdmin offers). It also keeps the sequential auto-numbering of the records and somehow that makes me feel more comfortable. Plus it’s faster. I’m old school.

I installed and tested the WP-phpMyAdmin plugin on my site. It works sometimes and it doesn’t some other times. When it works it does what it is supposed to do. Sometimes however it throws me back to a login screen where I need to enter the user-id and password OF THE DATABASE. This user-id and password is set in a file called “wp-config.php”. If you don’t have access to the server (with FTP e.g.) you will not know what to enter there. It might be the same user-id/password that you use to access the WP admin panel, but it could be something completely different (as it is in my case for extra security).

Let’s assume that it will work for you and won’t ask for a user-id/password:

What you need to do after installing and activating it, is go to the Tools section in the left-hand menu. There you will see a new menu item, called “phpMyAdmin”. Click that and you should be presented with a screen that looks exactly like the one before last image on the page that I mentioned before (http://codex.wordpress.org/WordPress_Backups). Your WP database should be selected automatically (it will show you a bunch of tables that all start with “wp_”). Click on the “Export” tab and you should see a screen which looks like the last image on that same page.

DON”T USE ANY OF THE OTHER OPTIONS (as this will most likely throw you back into the login screen).

Set all the settings as instructed in the last paragraph of the aforementioned page. Most likely you can just “Select All” (under point 1). Make sure all the other checkboxes (under point 2-3-4) are set as in the picture. You can safely set the radio button (point 5) to “gzipped”, as that will result in a smaller file transfer. Then hit the button “Go” (6). You should be asked for a LOCAL file and folder where to save this file. It will normally only take a few seconds to finish.

Keep this file in a safe place. You might want to add a date to the file name on your local computer. This file can be used again to restore your database by using the tab “Import” (as opposed to “Export” as you just did) to create an exact mirror copy of your data as it was when you exported it. The “Export” can be executed as often as you want, always remembering to rename the resulting file to a unique (date-stamped) name in case you want to keep several generations of the database.

When you’re done, there isn’t an elegant way to drop back into the WP admin panel. Using the browser button is not a good idea as it will try to execute some of the steps you went through before. Just close the browser window (or tab) of phpMyAdmin and open a new one to go back to your WP admin panel in the way you are used to do it.

If all that doesn’t work, by all means, use the WP Export function to generate a XML file. It is better than having no backup at all.

Good luck!

@st3pp3nw0lf
Both are great. Thank you

@oriste
I still cannot access my server because someone else set everything up for me (That’s been the main problem because they have disappeared). You are right. My version is not the latest but the one before. Again, waiting for my blog help to upgrade for me. Once I get hold of him, I am going to see if I can get full control so that this doesn’t happen again. In the meantime, I am seeing what I can do without access to the server!

Thank you so much for your help. Really appreciated.

I also noticed that WP-phpMyAdmin is relatively old (Last Updated: 2007-8-20) and compatible up to WP version 2.2.2 only. I would assume that your version of WP is higher than that (I’m currently at 2.7.1 and 2.8 is just around the corner). I will try and install it on my blog and see what I can learn from it.