Download your data

You can take a copy of everything in your workspace at any time. Pubblish builds it in the background and emails you when it is ready, so you never wait at the screen. The copy holds your records as one data file, and it can include your uploaded files as well. This guide covers asking for a backup, what arrives, and how to download it.

Who can download the data

Only the workspace owner and administrators. A backup holds the whole workspace, confidential files included, so it sits behind its own permission. The button still shows on Settings for everyone, but a member without permission is sent back to the dashboard with a message.

The page works in every subscription state. You can still ask for a backup and download it while a payment has failed, and after your workspace has closed.

Where to find it

Three buttons open the same page:

  • On the Settings page, click Download your data in the title bar.
  • On the Billing page, click Download your data under Manage. This button stays there whatever your subscription is doing.
  • On a closed workspace, click Download your data on the one page it shows you.

After your workspace closes

A closed workspace runs nothing and opens no other page — this one is the exception, and it is the reason the closed window exists. Sign in and you land on a page saying why the workspace closed and the date it will be deleted, with Download your data and Pay to come back on it.

You have 90 days from the day it closes. Ask for the backup early rather than on the last day: a backup with files can take longer than 24 hours to build, and the deletion runs on its date whether or not you have downloaded anything. If a backup is still being built when the date arrives, the deletion waits for it to finish.

If you are not the owner or an administrator, the closed page tells you to ask one — the download sits behind the same permission it always does.

Request a backup

  1. Open the Download your data page.
  2. To include your uploaded files as well, tick Include uploaded files (covers, manuscripts, documents, audio and video). Leave it clear for a data-only copy.
  3. Click Request a backup.

The page then shows In progress and hides the form until the backup is built. Allow up to 24 hours for a data-only backup, and longer if you asked for files. Pubblish emails you when it is ready, with a link back to this page.

You cannot add files to a request that is already waiting. Wait for it to finish, then ask again with the box ticked.

What is in the backup

The data file is one JSON file, compressed with gzip, so its name ends .json.gz. It holds your workspace records:

  • Titles, editions and their subjects, keywords and descriptions
  • People, contributors and the contracts and rights you have recorded
  • Sales figures, royalty rates, statements and payees
  • Manuscripts, beta reads, series, acquisitions and flows
  • Websites, newsletters, channels and smart links
  • Publishers and imprints
  • Workspace settings, your lists and your tags
  • The record of every asset you have uploaded: its name, category and what it is filed under

Some things are left out on purpose:

  • Your uploaded files. Included only if you tick the box. The data file describes them, and the parts hold them.
  • Saved API keys. The keys for your connected accounts are removed from the copy.
  • Help chat conversations, and anything sent to Pubblish through feedback. Those belong to the person who wrote them, not to the workspace, so an administrator never gets a colleague’s messages in a backup.

A backup is a copy for you to keep. Pubblish cannot load one back over a live workspace, so it does not undo a deletion.

Download it when it is ready

The Your backups table on the same page lists what you have. Status reads Ready when the backup is finished, and the Files column says Data only or Data and files. Click Download to save the data file.

A backup with files arrives as a set, not as one download. Under the main row you get one row per part, each with its own Download button, labeled like 1 of 4 — Manuscripts and editions. The groups are Manuscripts and editions, Documents, Images, Audio and Video. Each part is a zip file of up to 1 GB, so a large library splits across several. Download every part to have the whole set.

The last row of a set reads Manifest (what’s in each part). The manifest is a small JSON file listing every file in every part, with its size and checksum. Download it first if you want to see what you have before opening any zip.

One backup at a time

Your workspace keeps one backup. Asking for a new one replaces it, and the old one is deleted only once the new one is ready. Each backup is kept for 30 days unless a new one replaces it first.

Backups with files are rationed. If you ask for one soon after the last one finished, Pubblish refuses and tells you the time you can ask again. Data-only backups are never refused.

If a backup fails

A failed backup shows Failed in the Status column, and the row reads Ask for another one instead of a download link. Pubblish emails you as well. Click Request a backup again. If it fails a second time, click Help in the page header, then Ask.

Before your first request, the page says No backup yet.