Save Early, Save Often
Monday, February 27, 2006
So, seven years later, I've finally done something I've been meaning to do for a while. A full backup of my life.
What I mean by that is that over the years I've written a bunch of papers, I've created a lot of programs, and I've taken a lot of digital pictures. All these things are of value to me, because they're things I've done. They're the papers that you pull out when you're 50 and say, "Did I do this?"
Being a firm believer in the digital age, I don't print things out. That means that, while I'm saving a tree, I risk losing a lifetime's worth of work and history with the crash of a hard drive. I've been lucky so far, and I've saved myself often times by keeping my stuff on different computers and having multiple copies of it, etc. But that's not an incredibly efficient nor effective manner of backing up.
A month or two ago I purchased a DVD burner since I have a lot of pictures and stuff like that. It was obviously too much stuff to realistically burn onto CDs, and DVDs hold like three and a half to four times the amount that CDs hold.
Anyway, tonight I filled up two DVDs of "Life Backup" so that I have - on relatively sturdy media - a copy of what I've done. I think I got all the important stuff. I think I'll sleep better tonight knowing that.
What I mean by that is that over the years I've written a bunch of papers, I've created a lot of programs, and I've taken a lot of digital pictures. All these things are of value to me, because they're things I've done. They're the papers that you pull out when you're 50 and say, "Did I do this?"
Being a firm believer in the digital age, I don't print things out. That means that, while I'm saving a tree, I risk losing a lifetime's worth of work and history with the crash of a hard drive. I've been lucky so far, and I've saved myself often times by keeping my stuff on different computers and having multiple copies of it, etc. But that's not an incredibly efficient nor effective manner of backing up.
A month or two ago I purchased a DVD burner since I have a lot of pictures and stuff like that. It was obviously too much stuff to realistically burn onto CDs, and DVDs hold like three and a half to four times the amount that CDs hold.
Anyway, tonight I filled up two DVDs of "Life Backup" so that I have - on relatively sturdy media - a copy of what I've done. I think I got all the important stuff. I think I'll sleep better tonight knowing that.
posted by Burton at 12:12 AM
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