Thanks for your report and helpful screen recording, @warrengroom.
So far I can’t reproduce your “access is denied” errors under Windows 11 using Google Drive as my backup source in Local 10. Restoring a site from a backup works smoothly for me.
Are you running any security or antivirus software? It may be preventing Local or its subprocesses from writing to your sites folder. Local 10 shipped with two new executables called ‘restic’ and ‘rclone’ which security and antivirus software could flag. It would be worth checking security/antivirus logs and whitelists just in case.
It’s just standard Windows security, which is clean. I’ve checked protection history, Ransomware protection, Event viewer and SmartScreen logs. Would you like any additional log files. I seem to have a bunch:
Thanks for trying the Backups feature and for writing in!
After reviewing the log file, I see a number of lines that look like:
{"class":"BackupService","level":"warn","message":"Restore attempt 1 failed: ignoring error for \\.localbackupaddonignore.txt: UtimesNano: Access is denied.\ ...
I’ve never seen that kind of an error before, but searching google for “UtimesNano” lead me to this forum topic:
where the user came to conclusion that the folder that was being written to didn’t have the right permissions for restic to restore to.
I almost wonder if the files are being created, but that there’s some kind of setting that’s preventing the setting of modification times which results in an error from restic, which makes Local think that the restore failed. I know that the backups feature uses the user’s temp folder for restoring files, which for windows, I think is located at:
C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Temp
You might try adding that folder to the Windows Defender exclusion list and retry the restore.
Additionally, can you describe in a little more detail where these sites are located on disk? For example, do you have a different partition set for the “Preferences > New Site Defaults > Sites Path” ?
I need to get my hands on a Windows VM to try a couple of additional debugging things, but am curious to know if there’s any change in behavior when adding that temp folder to the Windows Defender exclusion list.
I added the Local\Temp filder to the exclusion list which didn’t help.
The new sites have been installed to C:\Users\\Local Sites. I did try changing the path to a different directory on the C drive and a different drive completely, although it still has the same issue.
I also tried restoring the same backups onto a second Windows 11 machine, which suffers the exact same problem.
Is there a reason there would be a restriction on the TEMP folder @warrengroom? Typically this EPERM error will pop up if there is a security/antivirus blocker or Read Only setting enabled.
Read-only isn’t checked and Defender is correct also. This is happening on 3 Windows 11 machines sharing the same Google Drive account, all with default Windows installations/setups. No 3rd party security.
I’ve tried managing the backups and restores in various directions between my desktop and 2 laptops. No restore works in any direction.
Thank you for the details here @warrengroom - we’re having trouble replicating this but are still digging in and trying to investigate further. Thank you for your patience and communication here.
Thanks @Nick-B. I’m going to be offline for a few days from tomorrow, but if there’s anything you need today or next week, just let me know. I’m happy to test some processes, send over files, jump on a screen sharing call, or whatever might be helpful.
I took another look at the logs you shared and I’m noticing something interesting.
In addition to the UtimesNano warnings I mentioned earlier, there’s a second error that appears about 11 seconds after the first attempt. On that second retry, the error changes completely - instead of UtimesNano (can’t set timestamps), it’s now CreateFile: Access is denied, which means Local can’t even access the directories anymore.
This pattern suggests something is locking the entire directory between the two retry attempts. My guess is this is related to Windows Defender Real-Time Protection - when Local restores about many files quickly (looking at the logs, about 5000 files of a modern WordPress install with a few plugins), it might trigger Defender to scan them, which could lock the directories.
I’m having trouble replicating this on my end because my Windows VM uses CrowdStrike from WP Engine’s IT department instead of the default Windows Defender, so I’m going to need your help to confirm what’s happening.
The question is: what’s running on your system that would cause the timestamp warnings on attempt 1, then lock the entire directory structure 11 seconds later?
Can you help me confirm a few things?
Windows Security settings: I’d love to know what kind of settings you have in Windows Security → Virus & threat protection. If you’re comfortable, can you take a screenshot of that screen, or at the very least let me know which specific options are enabled (Real-time protection, Cloud-delivered protection, etc.)?
During the next restore attempt, can you open Task Manager → Details tab and watch what’s using CPU/disk during that ~30 second window when it fails? Specifically, is “Antimalware Service Executable” (MsMpEng.exe) active?
This is a long shot, but when you originally created the backup, was Local launched as Administrator (Right-click Local → Run as Administrator)? And when restoring, are you running it as a normal user or as Administrator?
For the Windows Defender exclusions you’ve already added - did you add just the temp folder, or did you also add C:\Users\warre\Local Sites?
One diagnostic test that would help: create a brand new, minimal WordPress site in Local (default theme, no plugins), back it up to Google Drive, then try restoring that small backup. Does it succeed or fail with the same errors? This would tell us if it’s related to the backup size or something specific about the original site.
Based on what you find, we can figure out the right exclusions to add or whether we need to look into a permission issue with how the backup was created. When you have those answers, can you also provide an updated version of the Local logs by navigating to the Support tab in Local and clicking Download Logs?
