Pilot Light for Confluence: feature overview

Covered in this article:

• Overview
• Key benefits
• About the Rewind Labs Preview
• How access works
• Backup configuration limits
• What your team can see
• What isn't available in the preview
• Known behaviors
• Set up Pilot Light
• Common questions

Overview

When Confluence is down, your team can't reach the runbooks, policies, and project pages it relies on. Pilot Light shows your latest successful Confluence backup from Rewind, so the people you choose can keep reading those spaces. It doesn't depend on Atlassian, so it stays available when Confluence isn't. You decide who can use it and which spaces each person can see.

Key benefits

• Keep runbooks, policies, and project docs readable during a Confluence outage.
• Keep access when Atlassian is down, because Rewind hosts Pilot Light separately from Atlassian.
• Choose who sees each space by assigning Confluence groups and teams to it.
• Give your team access without Rewind accounts. Each person signs in with their work email and a one-time code.
• Track every access change in your Rewind audit log.

About the Rewind Labs Preview

Pilot Light for Confluence is a Rewind Labs Preview. That means it's an early release we're still building with customers. You get it early, and we learn how it works with real teams and real data.

While Pilot Light is in preview:

• There's no SLA for uptime or support response times. We answer Pilot Light questions as quickly as we can, but we can't commit to a response or resolution time.
• Limits and features may change as the preview goes on.
• Your feedback shapes what we build next. To share it, contact support.

You decide whether to include Pilot Light in a disaster recovery plan, business continuity plan, or audit response. If you do, keep in mind that the preview has no SLA.

In Rewind, you'll see a Labs preview badge next to the Pilot Light title. Your team sees a Read-Only Mode badge on every Pilot Light screen.

How access works

Pilot Light doesn't copy your Confluence permissions. Instead, you decide who sees what:

1. In a backup configuration, you assign Confluence groups or teams to each space.
2. You authorize that backup configuration for Pilot Light.
3. You activate the people from those groups and teams who need access.

An activated person can see every page in the spaces assigned to their groups or teams, and nothing else.

Backup configuration limits

You turn on Pilot Light for each backup configuration separately.

• Up to three backup configurations per Confluence site
  You can authorize up to three backup configurations at a time. To authorize a different one, deauthorize one first.
• Up to 25 activated people per backup configuration
  That's up to 75 people across three configurations. The limit applies to the people you activate, not to the user sync. Rewind syncs all your Confluence users, groups, and teams, and you choose who to activate.
• You activate people, not groups
  Adding someone to a Confluence group or team doesn't give them access. An administrator needs to activate them. Review who's activated after group or team changes.
• Include the spaces your team needs during an outage
  The preview is built for the spaces your team uses every day, not your full Confluence archive. Smaller configurations load faster and are easier to manage.
• Each space can be in one backup configuration
  To move a space, remove it from its current backup configuration first.
• Assign groups that have Confluence access
  Rewind lists every group in your Atlassian organization, including groups for other products like Jira. If you assign a group without Confluence access, its members can be activated and still see nothing.

What your team can see

• The spaces assigned to their groups or teams, including any personal spaces you added
• Each space's page tree
• The latest version of pages and blog posts
• Footer comments and inline comments
• Attachments and images in pages
• Links between pages
• Search across the spaces they can see
• Data from your latest successful backup

What isn't available in the preview

• Editing
  Pilot Light is read-only. You can't create, edit, or comment on pages, and nothing in Pilot Light is sent back to Confluence.
• Earlier backups and page history
  Pilot Light shows your latest successful backup. You can't pick an earlier backup or see page version history.
• Databases, whiteboards, and slides
  These aren't shown. If a page sits under a database or whiteboard in Confluence, a label shows where it's nested.
• Some macros
  Text, headings, lists, tables, images, attachments, and links work. Other macros show as a placeholder.
• Templates
  Space and page templates aren't shown.
• Anonymous access
  Everyone must be activated and sign in with their own email address.

Known behaviors

• External images load when you ask
  Images hosted outside Confluence don't load automatically. Click Load image to load one. Pilot Light doesn't contact the outside site until you do.
• Mentions may show a generic name
  An @mention may show a generic name instead of the person's name.
• Resolved comments may still show as open
  If a comment was resolved after your latest backup, it may still show as open.
• Deleted pages may still appear
  A page deleted in Confluence may still show in Pilot Light.
• Archived spaces may still appear
  Spaces archived after you installed Rewind may still show in Pilot Light.
• Icons and profile pictures are generic
  Pilot Light shows standard icons in their place.
• Removing access takes up to five minutes
  When you deactivate a person or a backup configuration, the change can take up to five minutes. If you deactivate a backup configuration, its spaces disappear for everyone who could see them.
• Deactivated people are signed out
  After the change takes effect, the person sees a message that their administrator ended their access. They can't sign in again unless you activate them again.
• Shared links don't sign people in
  If someone opens a link to a Pilot Light page without being signed in, they're asked to sign in from the Pilot Light link their administrator shared. Everyone signs in with their own email address and a one-time code.
• Heavy use can slow things down
  Pilot Light limits how many requests it handles at once to protect your backups. If many people use it at the same time, some may see a message that the service is temporarily degraded. Wait a moment and try again.

Set up Pilot Light

Once you've reviewed the limits above, follow How to set up Pilot Light for Confluence to sync your users, choose who can see each space, and share access with your team.

Common questions

• How to set up Pilot Light for Confluence Step-by-step setup for administrators.
• What does Rewind backup for Confluence? The data included in your Confluence backups.
• Confluence: Known Issues and Limitations Backup limits that also affect what Pilot Light can show.
• Pilot Light for Jira: feature overview The same read-only outage access for your Jira projects.