# Going back

You cannot permanently break your live site. Every time something is made live,
Hatchik first saves the version that was live before it — the files and, for an
app, a snapshot of its database at that moment.

The very first time a site goes live is the one exception, and it is not really
one: there was nothing there before it, so there is nothing to save and nothing
to go back to. From your second publish on, undo always has somewhere to go.

## Undo the last change

Say it in your own words: "undo that", "put it back how it was", "that broke
something, go back".

Claude puts the live site back to the previous version and restarts it. For an
app, the data goes back with it. It takes a few seconds.

## Go back further

Say "show me what I can go back to". You get a list of the saved versions with
when each one was published, and you pick one. Hatchik keeps the last 10
versions of a project's live site.

## What going back also undoes

For an app, the code and the data move together. That is usually what you want —
a change that corrupted your records is undone along with the change. But it
also means anything real that happened after that version was published is
rolled back with it: orders taken, accounts created, messages received, notes
left on a form.

Going back puts the database back to exactly how it was, which includes two
things worth being clear about:

- **Records added since stop existing.** Not just accounts — every kind of
  record your app keeps.
- **A whole kind of record added since is removed.** If your app started storing
  something new after that version — bookings, say, when the version you are
  going back to had no bookings in it — going back removes it and everything in
  it. It has to: leaving it behind would give you old code sitting beside newer
  records, which is a state your app has never been tested in.

You will not walk into either by accident. Before it touches anything, Claude
works out what going back would cost and tells you in one message: how many
records, from which part of your app, and which kinds of record would be removed
outright. Then it waits for you to say yes. If it cannot work out the number —
some records carry no date, so there is no honest way to tell which arrived
since — it says so plainly and still waits. It never goes ahead quietly.

If people have used your app since the version you are going back to, it is
often better not to go back at all: Claude can usually fix the code on its own,
which keeps everything your customers did. And if you want to keep what is there
before going back anyway, ask Claude to export the project first — one file with
all your data in it, in seconds.

## Apps with a lot of uploaded files

Files your app's users upload — photographs, documents, attachments — live
separately from its code and its database. Hatchik keeps a copy of them inside
each saved version too, so an undo puts the records and the files back together.

Above a size limit that stops being affordable: keeping ten copies of a very
large set of files would fill the machine. When an app is over that limit, its
saved versions hold the code and the database but not the files. Going back to
one of those puts your records back and leaves every uploaded file exactly where
it is, which can leave a record pointing at the wrong file.

You will not walk into that by accident. Claude checks before it goes back, and
if this is one of those versions it stops, tells you in plain English, and waits
for you to say yes. Your project page says the same thing. If you would rather
keep a copy of everything first, ask Claude to export the project — that is one
file with all your files and data in it, and it takes seconds.

## If there is nothing to go back to

Sometimes there is no saved version. Usually that just means you have only
published once — the first copy is of whatever the second publish replaces, so
it appears the second time you make something live, not the first.

Occasionally it means Hatchik tried to save a copy and could not. Publishing
still works, and your site is unaffected; what is missing is the copy taken
just before. When that happens Claude tells you, and so does your project page,
rather than letting you find out on the day you need it. There is nothing for
you to fix and nothing extra to pay — Hatchik can see it and is on it. Until it
clears, export the project before any big change so you are holding a copy
yourself.

## If you cannot reach Claude

Undo lives in the connector. If your connection to Hatchik has stopped working
and your live site is broken at the same time, reconnect it first — the
"Connecting Claude" page has the three steps, and it takes about a minute.

There is no undo button in the dashboard yet. If you are stuck with a broken
live site and no working connector, the fastest safe move is to sign in at
`https://app.hatchik.com`, open the project, and read its recent logs so you can
tell Claude exactly what it says once you are reconnected.