When running Apache Jackrabbit JCR as an embedded service in your app, is there a quick way to get a sound and consistent backup of the contents of the Jackrabbit repository without shutting Jackrabbit down? If so how?
See BackupAndMigration on the Jackrabbit Wiki for a list of options.
I would recommend to use XML export (system view), as it is the simplest solution. Also, because it is part of the JCR standard, so it should work on other JCR implementations as well.
Note that this approach has one drawback: it is currently not possible to re-import a full export, ie. from the root node and including the jcr:system subnode that contains the version storage, since the jcr:system part and especially the version storage are not writeable (this is mainly because JCR does not specify how to import versions). Here is some explanation on the Jackrabbit mailing list.