Sunday, January 10, 2010

Back Up

This is a reminder to back up all your stuff. Last week, my laptop somehow got infected with a particularly nasty virus so that I couldn't open any file to work on it. Thankfully, my husband has set up automatic backup of all my teaching and writing once a week to our family computer. He tried many things to get rid of the virus, but in the end, he had to reformat and reload everything. Took all day ... he's such a sweetie.

Added to this frustration was that our modem and Internet has been acting temperamental for the past few weeks. I don't mind being off-line when I *choose* to be offline but I do quite a bit of work where I need to be online, like when I download my lessons or upload essays or test questions into a company website.

Of course, I admit that when the net is down, I get more writing done :)

So, back up your stuff. You can use a thumb drive, or another computer in the home. I believe there are also companies that will store data on their servers for a small fee. I have also backed up drafts of my first novel on my email account.

Please share how you safeguard your writing.
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7 comments:

Bish Denham said...

Yup, yup, yup! Back-up's a must.

Molly/Cece said...

I hate that.

I have an extra hard drive, so I can hop over to that one if this one is persnickety.

Anonymous said...

no, no! That is aggravating! I'm so glad you're hubby had a backup installed. YAY!

My DH keeps reminding me to do the same. He says he'll back it all up if I get it all in one place.

I'm glad you've been getting in more writing, too. :)

hugs,
Donna

Suma Subramaniam said...

Vijaya,
Im so glad you got your data back. This reminds me, I got a flash drive that hasn't see its light of day with my drafts on it. I've got to start using it.

Best,
Suma.

Vijaya said...

Donna, a quick way to consolidate everything is to stick every folder into a Donna's Writing Folder and then do automatic backups from the Donna's Writing Folder. Anything new or changed will be backed up automatically.

Suma, it's nice to have a flash drive but you must remember to do it regularly. But I like the idea of having everything backed up on something I can hold in my hand.

We have an old computer that is too old to run any programs. That's where we have our extra hard drive for data storage.

Mary Witzl said...

Poor you!

Remind me to get my daughter to back up my files when I get home! And remind me to be grateful that both my husband and she remind to do this periodically (and you can see how effective they are...)

Vijaya said...

Mary, it's good that you have others reminding you.

Suma, I got me a dinky thumb drive also. Thanks for that great suggestion.