Backups to Dropbox

On Library, Spleen can back up your projects to your own Dropbox every night. Each copy is a Spleen Archive, the same file as Export → Spleen Archive, so it holds your writing, research, notes, annotations, snapshots, and both bins, and it can be imported into Spleen again. Because the copies live in your Dropbox, they stay yours even if something happens to Spleen.

Connect Dropbox

Open Account → Backups and choose Connect Dropbox. Dropbox asks you to sign in if needed and to allow Spleen access. Spleen only gets a folder of its own, Apps/Spleen, and cannot see anything else in your Dropbox.

You then return to Backups, which shows the Dropbox account you connected. The first backup runs that night; choose Back up now to make one straight away.

What gets backed up

Every night Spleen checks each of your projects and copies only the ones that changed since the last backup. Each project has its own folder, and every copy is named after the project with the date and time it was made, in UTC, for example the-salt-road-2026-09-26-0310-utc.spleen. Spleen keeps the newest 10 copies of each project and removes older ones.

Last backup shows the last time every project was safely copied. Back up now runs the same backup immediately and tells you how many projects it copied, or that everything was already backed up.

Restore from a backup

Download the copy you want from Dropbox, then import it as described in Importing Projects. The import creates a new project; it never replaces the one you already have.

When something goes wrong

If a backup cannot finish, Backups says why, and Spleen keeps trying each night:

• Your Dropbox is full. Free some space, or upgrade your Dropbox plan. Backups continue by themselves once there is room.
• Spleen no longer has access to your Dropbox. This happens when access is removed in Dropbox or the Dropbox account is closed. Choose Reconnect Dropbox.
• Dropbox could not be reached. A short outage is retried quietly; this message only appears when it lasts a few nights.
• Some projects could not be backed up. The others were copied. Spleen tries the rest again that night.

Disconnect

Choose Disconnect and confirm. Backups stop, Spleen deletes its access, and it asks Dropbox to remove it too. Copies already in your Dropbox stay there.

If you leave Library, nightly backups stop but the connection stays visible under Backups, so you can still disconnect.