When an update changes your data

Sometimes a new version keeps your data in a new shape: the views, widgets and tools you installed moved into packages, for example. The first time the new version starts, it moves your data to that shape, once. Nothing for you to do.

Show me what Hivemind updates changed in my data on this computer, using the "When an update changes your data" page.

1. Run `hive migrations --json` and list, for each data folder, the changes that ran, which version ran each and when, and whether its backup is still kept.
2. If anything is still to run or failed, say what and why, and what the page says to do about it.
3. Do not run `hive migrations restore` unless I ask for it.

REFERENCE https://hivemind.griiken.com/guide/data-updates.md

What happens on the first startCopy Anchor Link

The app, a hive command or hive host, whichever starts first, runs each change this version has that your data has not had yet, in order:

1. It copies the files that change will touch into migrations/backups/<change>/.
2. It makes the change.
3. It writes the change into migrations/ledger.json, with the version that made it and when.

Each data folder keeps its own ledger: the config folder and the app data folder (Data and where it is stored), which are one folder on Linux. If a second Hivemind process starts meanwhile, it waits up to two minutes for the first to finish, and says so. A change that was cut off (a crash, a power cut) runs again on the next start, from where it was.

A hive command started while an older app still runs leaves the files that app reads where they are, and says quit Hivemind to finish updating your data. Quit the app and start it again.

See what changedCopy Anchor Link

hive migrations

It lists each change that ran, by which version, how long it took and where its backup is; any change still to run; and the last one that failed, with why. --json gives the same for a script or an agent. A plugin a change could not keep (its files no longer pass the checks) is named in that change's result, and its folder stays in the backup.

Put it backCopy Anchor Link

hive migrations restore 0001-adopt-plugins-as-packages

This puts back the files as they were before that change, and before every change after it, and takes them out of the ledger. Quit the app and stop hive host first: it refuses while either runs, and changes nothing. The next start makes the changes again, so use it with the version you want to stay on (see Update and roll back).

The backups of the last three changes, and of any made in the last 90 days, are kept. A change is dropped from Hivemind six months after it shipped.

A version older than your dataCopy Anchor Link

If you go back to an older version after a newer one changed your data, the older one says once that your data was updated by the newer one, and starts anyway. hive migrations restore names the change to put back.

Last validated for Hivemind 2026.10.3.