website/php forum backup, restoration

[thomsbrain]

Hey guys, I currectly run a small personal website, with a php guestbook, forums, and some static html pages. I installed the forums and things through my web host, and from what I understand, the licenses are basically free. Anyway, I've been backing up my site regularly, but I was wondering what would happen to the forums if I had to switch hosts some time in the distant future? If my next host supports php, should I be able to just drag and drop my entire home directory into the new host and have everything work, or do php programs actually have to be installed somehow?

i'm such a newb.

 

[Entity]

You'll have to back up the PHP files and the database (I'm assuming it uses MySQL but could be wrong). What software is it?

Rob

 

[thomsbrain]

InvisionBoard is the forums, the guestbook is phpBook.

in my forums folder, where the index.php is, i've also got folders labeled: archive_in, archive_out, html, lang, pkg, Skin, sources, ssi_templates, style_images, and uploads, along with some more loose .php files. Does it sound like this is what I need to worry about backing up?

 

[Entity]

I would back up the entire forums directory. Then from the admin module, you can back up the entire database (admin -> SQL Management). Then you can restore that from an interface like PHPMyAdmin on your new server.

Rob