Backing up and restoring your diet tracker files

It is a good idea to make a backup of your data to ensure it is safe if something were to happen to your computer.

To backup your data…


1. Log into your user account

Perfect Diet Tracker Login
Select your user, then click on the ‘Login’ button to open your diary.

2. Select ‘backup your data’ from the file menu.

The file menu

Select the file menu and then the ‘backup your data’ option.

The software will ask you where you want to save your data then create a file in that location.

The file will be a ‘.zip’ file and contain everything you need to restore your user on this or another computer.

The suggested filename will include the date, we recommend you keep this format as it lets you see in an instant when backups were made. The filename must be a .zip file or subsequent restores may fail.


Restoring your data

To restore your data simply select the file menu and choose ‘Restore backup file’.

You will be asked to select a .zip file previously created with the backup option, this will then be restored.

You can also start the restore process from the login screen by selecting ‘Restore’ from the user selection box.


Other uses for backup and restore

In addition to keeping your data safe, backup and restore are also a great way to move your data between different computers.

For example, you may have a desktop and a laptop. You can select backup and save the .zip file to a USB memory stick, then restore this file on another computer.

Backups are universal and will work cross-platform, so if you have a Windows PC and a Mac you can move the data between them easily.

4 thoughts on “Backing up and restoring your diet tracker files”

  1. I’d like to delete my previous personal diet tracker history (and start anew) without losing group inserts, personal profile etc. How could I do this please? There’s about 2 years of it!

  2. Hi Alec,

    There is no real requirement to remove the old diary entries as these help the software work out your favorite items, so clearing these would reset your favorites, however if you want to erase your weight loss progress but retain favorites, groups etc. you can do the following:

    1. Backup your data using the file option so you can always go back!
    2. Delete your user in the Perfect Diet Tracker.
    3. Locate the file ‘progress.db’ on your computer and rename it to ‘progress.old’. This file is usually in c:/program
    files/perfect diet tracker/data on a windows system, and ~/username/library/Perfect Diet Tracker/ on a mac.
    4. Restart the Perfect Diet Tracker and create a new user with excatly the same name as your old user, but this time put in your new details, current weight and targets etc.

    This should then pick up all your old groups, favorites etc, but all the statistics relating to your progress and weight loss should be reset.

  3. I create my own recipes that give me the nutritional information I require. I then enter my recipe’s nutrition facts to PDT with the name of the recipe (new product).
    When I back up my profile, are my recipes (new products) backed up also?

  4. Yes, absolutely! All your data is backed up so in the event of a system issue, or just a change of computer you can restore the backup and be back up and running in no time at all.

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