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Slightly off-topic, but you're not the Cam Winstanley who used to write for Your Sinclair, by any chance? I used to love that magazine.
Back up your work!
- Thread starter Brian G Turner
- Start date
Susan Boulton
The storyteller
- Joined
- Mar 15, 2006
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- 2,039
I have and find it very good. I find I don't need to be on line to work on the documents. (If I am away from home with my laptop.) But when I do go on line it up loads the changes and when I turn on the main computer it downloads the changes to there. So no matter which machine I am using it is updating the copy on the other on as soon as it can.
Cam Winstanley
Member
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- 8
Your Sinclair was slightly before my time, Toby. But I did spend many years in the 90s working for Amiga Power magazine, which many regard as the spiritual successor to YS. So yes, I probably am the Cam Winstanley you're thinking of.
Coragem
Believer in flawed heroes
When I become a famous author 
)) I may be reluctant to send my work to gmail. Sometimes internet accounts are hacked, even if it's very, very unlikely.
I'm lucky to have an Apple Mac with the "snow leopard" operating system. It has an application called Time Machine, which automatically backs up work.
Even better (as long as it works!) the new Apple operating system (OSX "Lion") automatically backs up all work, AND it enables you to go back to any previous version of a document -- you preferred last week's edit of chapter 11, then no problem, OSX Lion will have kept it!
Coragem.
)) I may be reluctant to send my work to gmail. Sometimes internet accounts are hacked, even if it's very, very unlikely.I'm lucky to have an Apple Mac with the "snow leopard" operating system. It has an application called Time Machine, which automatically backs up work.
Even better (as long as it works!) the new Apple operating system (OSX "Lion") automatically backs up all work, AND it enables you to go back to any previous version of a document -- you preferred last week's edit of chapter 11, then no problem, OSX Lion will have kept it!
Coragem.
I am a pretty paranoid backup person. I am a software and web developer and run the finances as well as software development for my own compay. So I have a lot of very vital data on my computers.
I don't use the web I as I have just too much material to easily back up this way and, frankly, I don't really trust it (large amounts of company sensitive data). I currently have three main backup hard drives. One is backed up daily, another weekly and the third monthly. On top of that I have another drive kept in a different location, which I swap out with one of the others periodically (maybe four times a year).
This has saved my skin several times. I travel around on business a fair bit and my laptop can take quite a hammering. Over the years I would estimate that each laptop I have owned has had maybe 3 hard drive failures in the space of around 5 years each (about how long I keep a laptop before getting a new one). Desktop or Tower machines have failed less often but have still failed.
And don't forget to keep a check on your backup drives themselves - they can and do fail as well!
I don't use the web I as I have just too much material to easily back up this way and, frankly, I don't really trust it (large amounts of company sensitive data). I currently have three main backup hard drives. One is backed up daily, another weekly and the third monthly. On top of that I have another drive kept in a different location, which I swap out with one of the others periodically (maybe four times a year).
This has saved my skin several times. I travel around on business a fair bit and my laptop can take quite a hammering. Over the years I would estimate that each laptop I have owned has had maybe 3 hard drive failures in the space of around 5 years each (about how long I keep a laptop before getting a new one). Desktop or Tower machines have failed less often but have still failed.
And don't forget to keep a check on your backup drives themselves - they can and do fail as well!
Starchaser3000
Science fiction fantasy
I just use good old fashioned data disks.
Oh and if the first rule is back up with lots of different options, methods and mediums...
The second rule is ensure that you have a real geographical spread of copies. It doesn't matter if you have ten different storage mechanisms if you keep all the copies in one room and the room and all its contents burns to the ground/gets flattened into a pancake by an asteriod hit/cleaned out by thieves...
The second rule is ensure that you have a real geographical spread of copies. It doesn't matter if you have ten different storage mechanisms if you keep all the copies in one room and the room and all its contents burns to the ground/gets flattened into a pancake by an asteriod hit/cleaned out by thieves...
Yep, that's why I'm using Gmail - even if my house burns down and takes all my computers and backups with it, my manuscripts are still saved in Google's cloud to be retrieved from anywhere.
I'm with SJAB on this one. I love Dropbox. I recently wrote a note about it on Facebook:
Any writers out there working on two or more computers and finding it a constant hassle to keep your work updated on each machine? There's a free program that solves this problem, and I think it's fantastic (I've had it installed a few months). It's called Dropbox. When you move/save a file into the folder Dropbox creates on installation, your work is automatically saved onto the "Cloud" - Dropbox's encrypted webspace - which will then instantly update all other copies of your file on any machine that has Dropbox installed and internet access. You can also access your file(s) online using your browser if you're out and about (there's an option to "download" and "upload" files to and from your webspace), and there's even an app for mobiles.
It means that no matter which machine I switch on and use, I always have the latest copy of my work ready to hand without doing any copy-and-replace jobs or manual uploading and downloading of my files.
Plus, if you do as I do and permanently move your writing/story folder into your Dropbox folder, when you hit "Save" in Word/Works/Open Office, etc, Dropbox creates a new backup copy online for you (therefore you have multiple versions saved of your file - great if you change something you later regret). So, if like my mum you accidentally write over a story with an old copy, you log into your Dropbox account in your browser, then select the file you want... and pick its second recent save to download. Simple!
The free version includes 2GB of online Cloud storage, which is plenty for most people. I've talked all my friends and family into using it, too, which is great because there's a "refer a friend" feature that gives you 250MB more space every time someone signs up through you. (I haven't done that here, though, because that would be cheeky.)
http://www.dropbox.com/
It means that no matter which machine I switch on and use, I always have the latest copy of my work ready to hand without doing any copy-and-replace jobs or manual uploading and downloading of my files.
Plus, if you do as I do and permanently move your writing/story folder into your Dropbox folder, when you hit "Save" in Word/Works/Open Office, etc, Dropbox creates a new backup copy online for you (therefore you have multiple versions saved of your file - great if you change something you later regret). So, if like my mum you accidentally write over a story with an old copy, you log into your Dropbox account in your browser, then select the file you want... and pick its second recent save to download. Simple!
The free version includes 2GB of online Cloud storage, which is plenty for most people. I've talked all my friends and family into using it, too, which is great because there's a "refer a friend" feature that gives you 250MB more space every time someone signs up through you. (I haven't done that here, though, because that would be cheeky.)
http://www.dropbox.com/