Restoring Shared Drive Data

Once your initial shared drive backup is complete, you’ll be able to use the restore and export functions in Spanning. The amount of time it takes to complete your first backup will vary according to how much data is stored on your shared drive. Subsequent backups run faster since they include only new and changed data.

Spanning enables you to restore or export data from the shared drive's most recent backup. As a Spanning admin, you can restore or export data from a backup of any protected shared drive in your Google Workspace domain. If self-service for non-admin users has been enabled (see Roles & Permissions tab settings), then a non-admin user that has permission to access the shared drive is able to restore or export data from its backup.

See these procedures to restore or export data from the shared drive's most recent backup:

NOTE  Non-admin user self-service must be enabled in your Spanning environment to run this procedure with a regular user account. Otherwise, an admin user account is required.

  1. Do one of the following:
  • Log into Spanning Backup for Google Workspace as an admin user.
  • Log into Spanning Backup for Google Workspace with a non-admin user account that has access to the shared drive.
  1. Click Shared Drives. All drives you have access to in your Google domain display in the shared drives list.
  • For admin users, all drives discovered in the Google domain display in the list.
  • For non-admin users, only their drives display in the list.

NOTE  Shared drives are synced from Google daily. To check your Google domain for newly added drives, click :

  1. Locate the shared drive whose backup you will restore. To filter the list of drives, you can:
  • (Optional) Search for shared drives by name.
  • (Optional) Search for shared drives by using the advanced filters. This enables you to search by drive name, backup status, or tag.
  1. Click and select View Backups.
  2. Check boxes to select the files or folders to restore.
  • (Optional) Enter text in the Search field to search for files or folders by name.
  • (Optional) Click  to apply filter criteria. This enables you filter the list of files and folders by File/Folder Name, Modified By user, or Type (file or folder).

NOTE  Other search and filter options do not apply because only the most recent backup of each file or folder is available to restore.

  1. Click Restore.
  1. (Optional) Check boxes to select restore options:
  • Restore sharing settings – Select to recover any document sharing settings.
  • Notify external users – If you're restoring sharing settings, select this box to notify external users of the restore.
  1. Click Restore.
  2. The restore runs. Recovered items are placed in a Restored From (date) folder inside the shared drive. If the shared drive has been deleted from Drive, a new shared drive is created during the restore. You can view the results of the restore on the Activity Log > Past tab (see Viewing Application Activity).

Use these steps to export a shared drive backup into a compressed file. When the operation is complete, you receive an email with instructions for downloading the file.

NOTE  Non-admin user self-service must be enabled in your Spanning environment to run this procedure with a regular user account. Otherwise, an admin user account is required.

  1. Do one of the following:
  • Log into Spanning Backup for Google Workspace as an admin user.
  • Log into Spanning Backup for Google Workspace with a non-admin user account that has access to the shared drive.
  1. Click Shared Drives. All drives you have access to in your Google domain display in the shared drives list.
  • For admin users, all drives discovered in the Google domain display in the list.
  • For non-admin users, only their drives display in the list.

NOTE  Shared drives are synced from Google daily. To check your Google domain for newly added drives, click :

  1. Locate the shared drive whose backup you will export. To filter the list of drives, you can:
  • (Optional) Search for shared drives by name.
  • (Optional) Search for shared drives by using the advanced filters. This enables you to search by drive name, backup status, or tag.
  1. Select the drive, then click Export.
  1. Click Confirm to start the export.
  1. The export runs. When the export has finished compressing, you receive an email notification. You can view the results of the export on the Activity Log > Past tab.
  • Click the activity to view details about the export.
  • Click the Export link to save the export to your local hard drive.

NOTE  If the Export link is not clicked, it expires 14 days after the export has finished compressing. After the Export link has been clicked, it is disabled in 24 hours.