How often do you back up your work to disk?

[KillerMuffin]

Well? How often do you back your stuff up to a floppy or CD or something?

I was just thinking that I don't do it enough. If my HD crashed, I'd be fucked. Well, if it does in the next bunch of minutes. Backing up as we speak.

How often do you lose the disc/ks that you backed your stuff up onto?

Me, all the time.

*sighs*

 

[Axeltheswede]

backing up work

The word processing program I use, RoughDraft, backs up to a disc every ten minutes. Is this something unique or do most programs do that?

 

[Ray Dario]

I burn a story to CD when I "finish" it. Then when I go back and hack it all to pieces I burn it again when it is finished again and so on. Usually I keep all my working stories on a floppy. (I've heard all the inane remarks about that and don't need to hear any more!)

Now my hard drive is another story. I have two 60 gig hard drives in my PC and I have them mirrored so that if one fails I can just use the other until I get the one that failed replaced. Works out well as there is no way to actually "Back Up" sixty gigs. Well no way in my budget anyway.

Ray

 

[Quasimodem]

Axeltheswede

The word processing program I use, RoughDraft, backs up to a disc every ten minutes. Is this something unique or do most programs do that?

You can set the time duration between back-ups on WordPerfect.

Since I have become paranoid - with reason - about losing data, I have set the back up to every two minutes.

Backing up to floppies would cause a brief pause, so I back up from "D" hard drive to "E" hard drive.

Then, I copy the work to a floppy at the end of the session.

In the words of John Goodman, in ‘The Big Easy': "If that's not enough, I piss on ‘em!"

 

[Axeltheswede]

backing up work

Thanks for the info, Quasi. Now I know how to get rid of that pause.

Watch out, Ray. There is a tiny little person with an albino chicken looking for you.

 

[DVS]

That program is unique. Most programs, such as MS Word, will save what you have written but not saved in a matter of minutes that you can set. But usually, unless you take the effort to keep your files in at least 2 different places, you are gambling with fate.

If you have two hard drives, you can copy to the second drive as a failsafe. It is unlikely, both hard drives are going to crash, unless you catch a very nasty virus, lightning strikes the transformer powering your house, or a tree falls on your house, smashing your computer flat.

Companys backup every night, and before any major software install or update. In the case of a personal computer, only you can know when it is time for a backup. The older your machine gets, the more you will have to think about it. But, just because you have a brand new computer, don't think it won't fail. Electronic parts are like lightbulbs. They work great for a long time. But, they can and do fail without notice.

A company is told by auditors to keep backup tapes in a completely different building than the computer servers. So, there is a designated tech who usually takes these to a bank safety deposit box, or some other place. It is not allowed to keep at one's house, because if a fire was to happen, all generations of the backups would be gone, leaving the company with just the current files on the servers. Employees sometimes make errors and it is often necessary to restore files from weeks or months back, because of a mistake. This is because we are all human. The grandfather method of backup is usually the best for a company's data.

With a personal computer, basic common sense is all it takes.
Keep your important files in at least two different places. It is not likely both will crash. If one does crash, be sure you make a copy of the remaining backup, so you then again have two copies. If you are concerned, keep one in a different house or maybe in a bank deposit box. just keep in mind the hours of the bank, if you need to get to your files in the middle of the night.

Something to remember when thinking of what media you are going to use for your backups.
All media is distructable. Backup tapes can be damaged by dust, fire and extreme sunlight. Floppy disks are the same way. CD-RWs can withstand dust, but if they are scratch in the wrong spot, you will wipe out important data. Sunlight won't usually bother them, unless it is hot enought to warp them. And, the heat of a fire will melt them.
A hard drive is the safest place for your files. If you have two computers, putting your files on each computer would be the safest method of a 'live' backup. If you are lucky enough to have an in home network, it would be easy to do this.

Something to remember when keeping important files on a floppy disk, only...
Because of the way a floppy disk is designed, it is possible to get a speck of dust on the media disk inside the sliding sleeve. If you touch that media, your personal oil will then attrack more dust and any data on that spot could be lost. Always keep important disks in a closed package of some sort, and away from heat, direct sunlight and magnetic sources. Some monitors will give off magnetic waves and if you keep a floppy beside your monitor too long, you could rearange your story to mush. Most newer models are sealed, but don't find out the hard way.

The heads of a hard drive never actually touch the platter that the data is on. It floats a millionth of an inch above the platter. This allows the drive to last for quite a long time.
A floppy disk is NOT that way. Every time you stick your floppy disk into the drive, the heads will actually touch the media disk inside. After a period of time, that disk will start to develop bad sectors, because the media surface is wearing off. You should reformat your disks every so often, to check them for errors. If you get any bad sectors on a format, don't trust that disk for important files. And, I would just throw it away, if you can afford to. It will slowly aquire bad sectors, and one day it will aquire one in the middle of your most important file. All it takes is one small bad spot in a file to kill it.

One last thing. Keep your floppy drive clean of dust. If you use your drive a lot, you may be OK. But, if you have your computer on the floor, and your floor is carpeted, you could be collecting carpet dust inside the drive. If any dust gets on the drive heads, and you put a good, working floppy disk in this drive, you could ruin that disk with the dust that has accumulated on the drive head.

Well, sorry for talking so long. I don't need to be pissing any more people off.

 

[The_old_man]

Everything of importance is on "Grandfather,Father,Son" floppys.

While writing I have WordPerfect set to backup every 5 min. My mane problem isn't loosing disks, it's "which is the latest?"

 

[ilovewriting]

I back my work up every hour of work, and once a week i do a full back up- which for me is backing it up on 2 disks, one which is locked away, and one that is easily accessable so if there is a fire the first thing i would grab is my work.
That is for my novels of course. My short stories only get one back up disk when they are completed, and i dont even bother to backup what i write for LIT.

 

[JUDO]

Go to lunch, meeting, run, grocery, hair appt. - throw in a CD, drag the folder to Toast and hit return.

Usually about once a week. More often if I get paranoid.

 

[Quasimodem]

Interesting how many people cite "Paranoia" when discussing back ups.

Must be some truth in that old saying: "There are only two kinds of people.
Ones who have lost data in a system's crash; and one who haven't lost data, yet! "

 

[P. B. Walker]

I use a Read-writeable CD. I have one at work and at home. I often write at work when I have a few minutes of free time and then I take it home and finish there. So I actually back up everything to a CDRW... and then have a copy of it at work (hidden), plus the original copy at home.

I've actually had a file or two get corrupted. Just went back to my backup copy and was plugging away in a few minutes. The worst would be that I'd have to wait til I got back to work if my copy at home got corrupted AND the copy on my CDRW got corrupted.

That's about all the backup I'm willing to do. I try to use a new CDRW every 6 months or so. I usually save the last one...so I guess that's another level of backup too.

Writing data to those CDRWs is just as fast as writing it to your HD. CDRW's rock!!

- PBW

 

[Alex De Kok]

Not nearly often enough.

Alex

 

[jon.hayworth]

No I don't back-up work often enough. This thread has got me paranoid now. Mostly I save my work to a floppy. Now I am going to download them onto the HD.

Another point to consider is keeping a hard copy of finished work. One of the future problems of our "information age" maybe that we are a part of the first generation that will have no history.

The tapes, disks etc., may survive for hundreds of years, but will there be machines capable of reading them. Already people have "lost" work they created on the old Amiga, Commodore etc., early computers. Films on Betamax video etc are all going down the tubes of time - becoming more idecipherable than a lost civilisation's hierogliphics.

So as a historian may I plead that for the sake of posterity you keep paper print outs of your finished work - especially anything that is published. Even work published on Lit will be of interest to social historians in the future.

jon

 

[Quint]

I haven't ever lost stories or the like, but every time my dad updated AOL I'd lose everything in my "File Cabinet." Years of correspondence lost. Many a howl of frustration was heard around my residence, let me tell you.

Right now I'm rather forced to save onto a floppy; the computer I work on most of the time has no internet access. Plus it won't be coming with me to Mexico or Virginia. I NEED to be working for the next two months, so floppy it is! I'm old-fashioned, I suppose. At least I save on two floppies, so losing one won't wring more howls from me.

 

[wildsweetone]

interesting thread KM

thanks to everyone who's put in their penny worth on here. i'm learning a lot.

DVS what's the best way of keeping the drive free of dust? the old vacuum cleaner, or a hairdryer?

 

[DVS]

Re: interesting thread KM

thanks to everyone who's put in their penny worth on here. i'm learning a lot.

DVS what's the best way of keeping the drive free of dust? the old vacuum cleaner, or a hairdryer?

Actually, normal use is a pretty good way to keep it clean. Dust doesn't like to stay on anything that moves and if you are using your floppy drive every day, it might not be too bad. The ones you use only from time to time are the ones you need to be concerned with.

Now don't get turned on with this answer, but you want to suck and not blow. So, the hair dryer blows, and isn't really strong enough, either. The best is the vac with a nozzle on it to get into the small places. You can also get a can of air. Radio Shack, Walmart, or your neighborhood computer store will have those. They are pretty good, but not for the major jobs. Only after you suck it with the vac, then you can blow with the canned air, from time to time.

Also, if you're feeling brave...
the insides of a computer should be cleaned out, every once in a while, too. When it is needed depends on how dusty your climate is and where you keep your computer.
1)turn off the computer.

2)remove the shell or top cover.
2a)touch a metal part of the computer frame, to discharge any static electricity that may be in your body(This is usually needed in the winter when it is dry because of running a furnace).
All of the parts inside a computer are sensitive to static electricity, and if you zap a chip, you could also zap your computer. A static charge like you would get from a door knob after a trip over the carpet is a bad thing.

3)look for and "lightly" suck up all of the dust bunnies that have formed around the air intake ducts and on top of and around the edges of the motherborad, etc. Just think "where would I go if I was a dust bunny" and look there.

A computer keeps itself cool by sucking air in from the front and out the back. Over time, it will suck dust up inside, as a normal thing. The longer dust stays inside, it makes the computer run hotter than it should. It will last longer, if it runs nice and cool, like it was made to. And depending on how humid your area is, that dust can actually start to create a path for current. This means it could send electrical signals to places they aren't suppose to be. This could make your computer do funny things, and even damage it. This can happen in smokey areas more easily. The oils and tars from the smoke mixes with the humidity and dust and snap-crackle-pop!
OK, take it easy. It is not a common thing, but companies have to deal with that because of the way they setup computers and forget about them.

The power supply of a computer is the only spot where AC (house current) is found. All other devices are run by DC current, and it is usually 5 volts or 12 volts. You can't be hurt from that, but you can hurt it.
But, watch for the processor. That is probably a 3 inch (estimated) square boxy thing on your motherboard. The processor is the brain of your computer. It does a lot of thinking and it gets very hot. The newer chips even have to have a cooling system on them. Most of that 3 inches is the cooling part. But, it all can get hot.

Your computer will love you for this, and maybe the next time it wants to crash, it will think of this and decide not to. I said maybe.

 

[DevilBoy79]

eh i would but for some reason everytime i go to use a diskette it freezes up the computer, i dunno oh well

 

[wildsweetone]

ty dear

i will print that lesson off and suck it all up very thoroughly.

 

[His_kitty]

Because I tend to procrastinate about burning or copying my writings, I opened an email account just for them. I keep them stored there, just makes it easier to find seeing as how I'm bad for misplacing disks and cd's.

 

[nitengale]

trashed discs

I once had the great idea to back up all my stories. I bought some pretty discs, did the uploading or downloading, and then put them all in a cute little box.

Somewhere along the lines, the pretty little box and all its pretty little discs filled with my smutty stories got trashed.

Now I email my stuff to my self. So out in cyber land there is a whole email box filled with wonderful smutty stories written by me.

Life...is good.

 

[DVS]

It really doesn't matter how you do it, just keep the general rule of thumb in mind...always have two seperate copies, at all times. So, if one is destroyed, you still have one to make another copy.
Muphy's Law...anything that can go wrong, will go wrong.

 

[jon.hayworth]

Am I glad I keep all my work on floppies last night I tried to partition my HD and install 2K - something went wrong (mea culpa) and I have lost everything on the HD!

Fortunately none of my work.

jon

 

[Guest]

I tried to partition my HD and install 2K - something went wrong (mea culpa) and I have lost everything on the HD!jon

Any time you change the partitions of your hard drive, it is a very risky thing. Even with programs such as Partition Magic, you are still gambling with fate.

 

[DVS]

Any time you change the partitions of your hard drive, it is a very risky thing. Even with programs such as Partition Magic, you are still gambling with fate.

Damn computer programs. The above was me, by the way.

 

[WHITE ASH]

dsf