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Some Random Thoughts on Backing Up Your Databy Dan Butler My recent computer problems have been thinking about backups and which data is important on my computer. While typing my thoughts up I heard sirens outside. Looking out the window I saw firetrucks coming down the street. I noticed the orange flames above the roof of a house across the street. It was 3:00 am. I quickly woke my wife and we went outside to get more information. Here is a picture of what I saw:
I know you can't see much in that picture but those are flames above the roof of the home across the street. Fortunately it wasn't the house on fire but the shed in the backyard next door. Nobody was injured. Think about if there had been a fire at your house. Would you have been prepared with your data? Certainly a computer would not be the first thing you grab. But the data on that system could make your life much easier if you had it. Think about the recent hurricanes and people displaced by the water.A backup of certain data would make life much easier. When my car caught fire several years ago I made sure to grab my briefcase. It had the backups and files I needed to keep running. Similarly when a tornado in March of 2000 hit the building I was working in I made sure to grab my backup disk. That backup disk enabled me to keep working almost uninterrupted until we were allowed back in the building a month later. Two weeks before the tornado I was giving a talk at a local high school. Just before the talk the fire alarms went off and the building was evacuated due to a bomb threat. The week before the tornado I spent at a hotel room in Dallas, TX with a borrowed laptop while one of my children recovered from surgery. Reading the above you may decide I am a safety risk! Well it was an interesting period of time. The common denominator in all the above scenarios was a small Zip disk containing all the important files I used and updated on an ongoing basis. I was able to switch computers and locations quickly without downtime. When thinking about backups we often think of a copy or image of the current hard drive, but that only helps if the hard drive goes out. The solution we have recommend in our books over the years involves automatically copying one hard drive to another. When the first drive goes out, you simply swap in the extra drive. What if you are unable to access your computer? The swap does not help much. So I personally carry a small "snapshot" of important data with me. The snapshot includes my financial information, passwords, current work files, addresses, etc. For me this is on the Zip disk I mentioned earlier. I do not recommend buying a Zip disk just for this task. CD-ROM's are much cheaper and more universal today. I have the Zip so I use it. What else do I keep on the Zip disk? My current writing projects, records necessary to run the TNPC Store Why not use a little keychain sized USB storage device? For me they are just too small. I am afraid of losing them. I have lost Memory Sticks from my camera. I do not want that to happen with my data. Sensitive data is PGP encrypted. If the disk is stolen that data is not accessible to anyone without the private key and the passphrase. Since I may have to access this data from another computer I keep the PGP install program on the disk as well. I install that first then I can decrypt my files. The procedure I use to encrypt/decrypt the files is exactly the same as what I teach in my book Tame Your Email. If you do not use PGP - and I think you should - you can simply zip the files with a program like Winzip and put a password on the file. That is a basic level of protection. Next zip the zip file and use a different password. Now you have two levels of security. The important thing is to remember the passwords! Personally I will continue to use PGP. It is much stronger and it is one less worry for me. I will talk more about backups in future issues. For now I recommend you put a pad of paper next to your machine. Start making a list of all the files you cannot live without. After a few weeks your list will be pretty complete and will contain items you probably did not think of originally. Now you can plan a way to back those files up and have access to them in case of emergency. Do this now while you are thinking about it. I have started a thread at the TNPC Talk board where we can share what types of files are important to you and different methods of backup. Come on over and share your thoughts. You can find the forum here: http://www.TNPCnewsletter.com/discuss/ Give some thought to your backup needs now - before you find yourself in crisis mode. -- Dan Butler is the Editor-in-Chief of TNPCNewsletter.com and the ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ |
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