FAQ

Quick answers to common questions.

General

Is DBdock free?

Yes — MIT licensed, free forever, self-hosted. No SaaS component, no vendor lock-in.

Who’s behind DBdock?

Created by Naheem Olaide. Open-source project, contributions welcome on GitHub.

Is DBdock production-ready?

DBdock is used in production by multiple teams. The backup and restore pipelines have been stable since v1.0. Cross-database migration (MongoDB ↔ Postgres) is newer — we recommend a dry run before production use.

How is DBdock different from pg_dump?

pg_dump is the engine — DBdock builds around it with:

• Storage adapters (S3, R2, Cloudinary, local)
• Compression and encryption pipelines
• Retention and scheduling
• Restore UX with filtering
• Cross-database migration (MongoDB ↔ Postgres)

Think of DBdock as the “everything around pg_dump” toolkit.

Installation

Can I use DBdock without installing it?

Yes — npx dbdock <command> works without installing.

Does DBdock need Node.js?

Yes, Node 18 or later. If you can’t install Node, a Docker image is the easiest workaround.

Which Postgres versions are supported?

DBdock supports whatever your pg_dump supports. In practice: Postgres 12+. Match pg_dump version to your server version.

Backup behavior

How long does a backup take?

Depends on database size, compression level, and network. Rough ballpark:

• 100 MB DB, local storage: ~2-5 seconds
• 1 GB DB, S3 us-east-1: ~30-60 seconds
• 10 GB DB, S3 cross-region: ~5-10 minutes

Run a test backup and measure for your setup.

Can I back up a live production database?

Yes — pg_dump uses MVCC so it doesn’t block reads or writes. Expect:

• Slightly higher CPU during the dump
• Temporary replication lag on replicas
• Long-running transactions can hold locks until the dump completes

Run during low-traffic windows if possible.

Can I back up only some tables?

Not directly in the CLI yet — it’s a whole-database tool. For partial backups, use pg_dump --table=... directly and upload the result yourself.

Follow issue tracker for table-level backup support.

Does DBdock support incremental backups?

PostgreSQL doesn’t have native incremental dump — DBdock does full logical backups each time. For incremental, use PostgreSQL’s built-in WAL archiving separately.

Cross-database migration does support incremental mode — see Incremental migration.

Restore

Can I restore to a different database?

Yes. In dbdock restore, choose “New Database Instance (Migrate)” and enter target connection details. See dbdock restore.

Can I restore only specific tables?

Not through DBdock. Restore into a temporary database and use pg_dump --table to extract what you want, then load into the target.

Can I preview a backup’s contents?

Not via DBdock currently. Restore to a temporary database and query it.

Storage

Can I use multiple storage providers simultaneously?

No, DBdock has one active provider per config. Workarounds:

• Run multiple DBdock configs (different dbdock.config.json paths via DBDOCK_CONFIG_PATH)
• Sync the primary storage to a secondary (S3 cross-region replication, rclone, etc.)

How do I migrate backups between providers?

DBdock doesn’t have a built-in migrator. Options:

• AWS CLI / rclone — copy files at the storage layer
• Manual — dbdock list, download each, re-upload to new provider
• Accept split history — switch providers, new backups go to the new location, old ones stay where they are

Do backups work with S3 Object Lock?

Yes. Object Lock is set at the bucket level; DBdock just writes objects. Be aware that retention policies (dbdock cleanup) can’t delete locked objects, so coordinate the two retention systems.

Encryption

What’s the encryption algorithm?

AES-256-GCM. Key derived via PBKDF2 with 100,000 iterations.

Can I use multiple encryption keys?

Not simultaneously. DBdock reads one key at a time. For rotating keys, see Key rotation.

Can I disable encryption for some backups?

Yes — pass --no-encrypt:

npx dbdock backup --no-encrypt

Does encryption slow backups down?

Measurably, but not dramatically. AES-256 on modern CPUs is fast (AES-NI hardware acceleration). Most of the time is still spent in network/compression, not crypto.

Migration

Can I migrate MongoDB to PostgreSQL?

Yes. See Migration overview.

Can I migrate MySQL / SQL Server / Oracle?

Not yet. Current support is PostgreSQL and MongoDB in either direction.

What about live replication?

DBdock migration is batch-oriented — not live replication. For CDC-style streaming, use Debezium, Airbyte, or similar.

Development

Does DBdock have a TypeScript SDK?

Yes. All programmatic APIs have TypeScript definitions. See SDK overview.

Can I extend DBdock with custom storage providers?

Currently the four built-in providers (local, S3, R2, Cloudinary) are hardcoded. Adding a new provider means contributing a new adapter — open a PR.

Where do I report bugs?

• GitHub issues
• Security issues privately via security advisory

Pricing / hosting

Is there a hosted DBdock?

Not currently. DBdock is a self-hosted CLI. You provide the compute, DBdock provides the logic.

Is there a GUI?

Not currently. The CLI has interactive pickers for many operations. For a web dashboard, follow issue tracker.

Still have questions?

GitHub Discussions

Ask the community.

Troubleshooting

Common issues.