# Applications Backup & DR

The Applications Backup & DR feature enables you to back up, monitor the backup process for, and restore your applications and the infrastructure they depend on using an Infrastructure‑as‑Code (IaC)–first approach.

This feature integrates application resilience directly into day‑to‑day cloud operations, enabling teams to define application backup policies, monitor the backup process, and restore applications using Infrastructure as Code (IaC).

## Overview

Applications Backup & DR helps teams:

* Define application‑level backup policies across cloud providers
* Gain clear visibility into snapshots, coverage, and backup health
* Recover predictably by restoring infrastructure as Terraform
* Keep environments consistent under pressure with IaC‑first disaster recovery

This approach ensures consistent, repeatable recovery workflows during incidents.

## Application Policies

Application policies define which applications are backed up and when backups are executed. Applications are identified using tags, which represent logical groupings of cloud resources.

### Creating an Application Policy

To create a new application backup policy:

1. Go to **Applications Backup & DR → Policies**
2. Click **Create Policy**
3. Configure the policy fields:
   * **Policy Name** (required, unique)
   * **Data Source** (AWS, Azure, GCP, OCI etc.)
   * **Region**
   * **Tags** (required key-value pairs that define the application scope)
   * **Schedule Frequency** (On-Demand, Daily, Weekly, Monthly)

Once created, the policy becomes active and generates application snapshots based on the selected schedule.

### Policy Scope and Application Relationships

When a policy targets an application component (for example, an EC2 instance), Firefly automatically captures all required relationships and dependencies needed to restore the application correctly, such as:

* VPC
* Subnet
* IAM instance profile

Resources that are implicitly created as part of these relationships and dependencies are not backed up separately, as they are recreated during restoration.

**The following assets are not eligible for backup:**

* Deleted assets
* Assets in an undetermined state

## Restoring Applications

Applications are restored by generating Terraform code, rather than performing direct cloud mutations.

### Restoring from a Snapshot

To restore resources:

1. Open a snapshot
2. Select one or more resources
3. Click **Restore Selected**
4. Preview the generated Terraform code
5. Continue with Firefly's IaC orchestration flow

This ensures restored resources remain:

* Fully codified
* Auditable
* Aligned with existing IaC standards

## Common Use Cases

* Recover infrastructure after accidental deletion
* Restore a subset of resources without impacting the entire environment
* Recreate infrastructure in a different region using Terraform
* Validate backup coverage and compliance across teams

## Notes & Limitations

* Restoration availability depends on Terraform provider support
* Large snapshots may take longer to load resource inventories

***

Applications Backup & DR provides a safety net for your cloud infrastructure by ensuring you can quickly recover from incidents while maintaining consistency with your Infrastructure as Code practices. By treating disaster recovery as code, teams can test, version, and automate their recovery procedures just like any other infrastructure component.


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