Every host paces a backup differently, so MokoSuiteBackup ships a tuning wizard that probes your server — PHP limits, disk speed, site footprint — and sets the host-wide step values for you. It's required after a fresh install: until you run it, both interactive backups and pre-action (before update/install/uninstall) backups stay gated, while automated backups and updates themselves keep running.
Overview
Every host is different — PHP time limits, memory ceilings, disk speed and site size all affect how a stepped backup should be paced. Execution Tuning is a set of host-wide component options that control how MokoSuiteBackup breaks a backup into steps, plus a Run tuning wizard that probes the host and fills those values in for you. Get tuning right and large sites back up reliably on shared hosting without timing out; leave it wrong and a backup can stall or die mid-step.
These are host-wide component options, not per-profile or per-destination settings — they apply to every profile and every destination on the site, and both backup engines consume them. Find them under Components > MokoSuiteBackup > Options > Execution Tuning.
The Tuning Values
| Option | Controls | Out-of-box default |
|---|---|---|
| Files per step | How many files are packed into the archive in a single AJAX step before the engine returns and continues on the next request | 100 |
| Seconds per step | The wall-clock budget for one step — the engine stops the current step and yields once this many seconds have elapsed, keeping each request comfortably under the host's execution limit | 10 |
| Upload chunk size (bytes) | The size of each chunk streamed to remote destinations (resumable/multipart uploads) | 2 MB (2097152) |
| “Inside” wrapping viable | Whether wrapping the restore script inside the archive (the sidecar-free delivery mode) is fast enough on this host to be recommended | Yes/No, set by the wizard |
A value of 0 for any numeric field means engine auto — the backup engine picks a value at run time rather than using a fixed number. The conservative out-of-box defaults (100 files/step, 10 seconds/step, 2 MB chunk) are deliberately safe for the lowest-common-denominator shared host until the wizard measures the real one.
The Tuning Wizard
The Run tuning wizard button sits on the Execution Tuning options screen. When you run it, it probes the actual host and the site's file footprint, then writes the measured values back into the tuning options. It measures:
max_execution_time— the host's configured PHP time limit.- Whether
set_time_limit(0)sticks — some hosts silently ignore attempts to lift the time limit; the wizard checks whether it actually takes effect, which determines how aggressive the per-step budget can be. memory_limit— the PHP memory ceiling.- A disk I/O benchmark — a short read/write test to gauge how fast the filesystem is.
- The site's file footprint — via a
FileScannerpass, how many files and how much data a full backup would have to process.
From those measurements it fills Files per step, Seconds per step, Upload chunk size, and decides whether “Inside” wrapping is viable on this host. Because the values are host-wide, you only need to run the wizard once per site (and again after a hosting change).
The wizard's suggestions are not saved until you Save. When the probe finishes, the values are filled into the fields client-side and the result box appears as an orange warning reading “Not saved yet — click Save (or Save & Close) to apply these tuning values.” Saving persists the values and clears the pending flag; navigating away without saving discards them.
A Reset tuning wizard button sits next to Run tuning wizard. It re-arms the wizard on demand — resetting the tuning values to their defaults and re-setting the pending flag — without reinstalling the component, so the gate and post-install behaviour can be re-tested against a fresh state.
The Wizard Is Required After a Fresh Install
On a fresh install of MokoSuiteBackup, a flag is set marking the tuning as pending. (Because the wizard measures host capabilities, which an extension update does not change, it is not re-armed on every update — a never-tuned site stays gated across updates until the wizard is actually run, and a genuine host change is handled by the Reset tuning wizard button.) Until you run the wizard and clear that flag:
- Interactive (UI) backups are blocked. The run-backup screen shows a modal telling you to run the tuning wizard first, the Dashboard shows a reminder that links to the wizard, and the Backup Now button is disabled.
- Pre-action backups do not run at all. Pre-update, pre-install, and pre-uninstall backups are gated too — while the flag is set, no safety backup is taken before an update, install, or uninstall. Each time one is skipped, MokoSuiteBackup raises an admin warning and writes a matching entry to the
mokosuitebackuplog stating the action continued without a backup, so it is never silent. The “skip pre-update / pre-install” opt-out checkboxes are hidden while the flag is set, since there is nothing left to opt out of. - Unattended backups keep running. Scheduled tasks, web-cron, CLI, and API-triggered backups are not blocked — they continue on the current (or conservative default) values, so your unattended protection is never interrupted.
- Updates are never blocked. The pending-tuning flag gates backups, not updates — you can still install and update extensions and Joomla core.
While the wizard is pending, updates and installs proceed with no pre-action backup. This is a deliberate, accepted trade-off: rather than back a site up on unverified host limits, MokoSuiteBackup takes no backup and says so loudly (admin warning + mokosuitebackup log entry). If you are about to update or uninstall something important, run the wizard first.
Running the wizard clears the flag, which unblocks interactive backups, restores pre-action backups, and dismisses the reminder.
Managed-Site Reporting
The pending state is surfaced to fleet management. The backup heartbeat reports a tuning_pending status, and MokoSuiteHQ flags any managed site whose tuning wizard has not yet run — so an administrator managing a fleet can see at a glance which sites still need tuning.
Recommended Workflow
- Install MokoSuiteBackup.
- Open Components > MokoSuiteBackup > Options > Execution Tuning.
- Click Run tuning wizard and let it probe the host.
- Review the values it filled in (adjust manually if you have a reason to), then Save — the orange “Not saved yet” notice will clear once you do.
- Interactive and pre-action backups are now unblocked — run a manual backup to confirm.
Documentation
Full documentation is on the MokoSuiteBackup Wiki.