Compilation on Windows

If you just want to USE Box Backup on Windows, we recommend that you don't compile it, but instead download the latest released binary package from the Windows Client Releases page.

Compilation

Box Backup can be compiled and run on Windows as a native application, without using Cygwin.

Currently the only supported compiler is Microsoft Visual Studio (Visual C++) 2012 or later. Other compilers were supported before (e.g. MinGW) but we do not have the resources to keep them working and tested.

Please follow the instructions to compile with Microsoft Visual C++.

Installation

Copy all the files from the distribution ZIP file into c:\Program Files\Box Backup.

Replace bbackupd.conf with win32\bbackupd.conf and edit to suit your needs.

You will need to generate the certificate and keys on a Unix box, or using Cygwin to run the bbackupd-config script. Boxi will eventually make it possible to do this on Windows without Cygwin.

You must manually create a subdirectory C:\Program Files\Box Backup\bbackupd for the daemon to create some temporary files (last_sync_start and the PID file). You must ensure that the user running Box Backup has permission to write to this directory. If you run Box Backup as a service, then normally this will be the LocalSystem user.

If you have done all the certificate stuff correctly your C:\Program Files\Box Backup\ directory will contain the four certificate related files (assuming you set up account 1):

• 1-cert.pem
• 1-key.pem
• serverCA.pem
• 1-FileEncKeys.raw

Windows Service

On Windows, Box Backup would normally be run as service, in which case it will be automatically started at boot time in the background. To install this, open a command prompt, and run:

"C:\Program Files\Box Backup\bbackupd.exe" -i

This should output Box Backup service installed. You can remove it again with the following command:

"C:\Program Files\Box Backup\bbackupd.exe" -r

The service will look for bbackupd.conf in C:\Program Files\Box Backup by default. If you want to place the configuration file somewhere else, you can specify its location on the command line:

"C:\Program Files\Box Backup\bbackupd.exe" -i "C:\Box\Conf\bbackupd.conf"

You cannot install the service twice. This may give you the infamous error 1078. Please remove the service before trying to add it again, for example if you change the location of the Box Backup directory.

If the service fails to start, it may be because the DataDirectory is not writable by the LocalSystem user (or whatever user you run the service under).

If you have any problems following these instructions, please sign up to the MailingLists and report them to us, or send an email to Chris Wilson. Thanks!

Upgrading

1. Stop the old client service.
2. Make a backup of your current installation (usually in C:\Program Files\Box Backup), especially the bbackupd.conf and FileEncKeys.raw files.
3. Unzip the new zipfile.
4. Copy all the contents (excluding bbackupd.conf) into the directory where the old client is stored.
5. Start the service, check that it stays running.

You should not need to remove and reinstall the Box Backup service, unless you are upgrading from a very old installation. If the Box Backup service fails to start after the upgrade, or does not behave as expected, please try to remove and reinstall the service as follows:

1. Remove the old service with "bbackupd.exe -r".
2. Install it again with "bbackupd -i" (and the path to the configuration file, if not C:\Program Files\Box Backup\bbackupd.conf).