Forum Discussion
Planner Plan Backup Resolved
Just wrapped up an excellent nightly backup solution for your Plans! This Power Automate system captures your entire Microsoft Planner Plan, including checklist items, assigned names, dates, labels, and priorities, and generates a dated backup Excel file in SharePoint. Saying goodbye to worries about accidentally deleted tasks or plans 
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Additionally, I'm nearly finished with a backup import trigger that will generate a new Planner Plan with any of this nightly generated back up files as needed. I'm also exploring the option of incorporating comments into the backup file soon. Certainly know a way to make it happen!
This automation is part of a larger course/solution package I'm developing. Other upcoming features include automatic assignment of unique project codes (you can catch a glimpse of it in the title column), auto-assignment of staff based on labels (for instance, if your yellow label is labeled Marketing, it automatically assigns everyone in marketing when used), working comment notifications and more.
I'm eager to hear your thoughts on this backup solution, and if enough people want it just @mention me in the comments below. Suggestions also always welcome!
28 Replies
MatthewJamesDavis​ I'm quite interested in this backup for Planner. Do you have a copy to share or steps on how I can reproduce it?
do you have still the project by picture or by code , i would be interested...
hi MatthewJamesDavis where can I find how to create this same process? I'm trying to backup regularly but cannot find how to do so.
Thank you for your work and contributions here! Any info on the latest build? Can I offer assistance to test/validate? :)
I was wondering if you have a new link to the Power Automate solution with the version two fixes for:
The known issues include:
- Your plan must have labels assigned to all tasks.
- Comments are currently not included.
- Dates (start dates/end dates) need formatting adjustments.
- User accounts need to be integrated into the automation to ensure that the "Assigned to" column displays full names.
and if you have completed the transfer back to MS Planner when necessary?
Also, have you thought about a process to notify the owner of the plan when someone does accidentally delete something so you know when to implement the transfer backup?
for the above known issues in version one backup; are there explanations for what these should be for each issue? like any label on all tasks? what is the proper date format?
Thank you.
- Will this recover deleted buckets along with the details as well for premium?
Hello Matthew!
May I ask if there has been any progress towards your version two of this brilliant work?
Thanks in advance 🙂
- Hi Lettmetall, currently working on this. Been tied up in other projects. So version two would cover adding in comments to the back up, and removing the need to always having to label every task. Anything else hoping to see?
- Thanks to those that reached out to me on Linkedin about this, let's get version two going shall we! Back with you over the coming week. 🙂
- I'm excited to see what version 2 looks like - the accidental delete aspect is one of our biggest concerns with using Planner.
Would this work with the "premium" version too (we haven't got it yet, but we were interested in the sub tasks etc).- We will need to do some testing with the premium version, but i can't see any reason why not! I've only just managed to pick this back up. I'll be back with an update soon.
I've generated version one as a Power Automate solution for everyone to test (see attached). Please be aware that this is an initial release with a few identified bugs, which I am actively addressing for version two.
The known issues include:
- Your plan must have labels assigned to all tasks.
- Comments are currently not included.
- Dates (start dates/end dates) need formatting adjustments.
- User accounts need to be integrated into the automation to ensure that the "Assigned to" column displays full names.
As said, I'm working on resolving these issues for the upcoming version two. Additionally, I am developing a secondary automation to seamlessly transfer data back into Microsoft Planner when necessary.
I'll prioritise addressing these concerns and second automation based on demand, so please share your feedback in the comments or by liking this post.
Thank you for your patience, and I hope you enjoy testing the current version.
the solution imported on my Power Automate seems to be empty
The workflow sounds great. Unfortunately, the provided version cannot be imported because the [Content_Types].xml file appears to be incomplete.
Is a more recent version available?
- It's not working for me, when I go upload in power automate I get an error message/red banner "try again later"... is there a way around this? Thanks!
Great function. Could you share more or share more about how to achieve this in Power Automate
Sorry for the delay Sunsadymark, this was a big one so i've simple provided the zip file to pull it straight into your Power Automate. You just need to update what Plan it's looking at, the location you want the file and a few other obvious bits. I've just posted the file as a reply to my original post :).
- Thanks for the message. give me till middle of next week and i'll write up a step by step process on how to do this yourself.
Thank you Matthew. Look forward to learn more about this. Cheers. MatthewJamesDavis
