11 errors of your backups
All users can be divided into two groups: those who regularly make backups and those who have not yet begun to do them. If you fall into the second category, this only means that you are not well or not fully aware of the number and magnitude of the troubles that could damage your data - theft, fire, hurricane, viruses, software bugs, hardware crashes, errors users and stuff like that. Well, or have not yet faced with the passage of the "quest" to recover data after losing it (which, unfortunately, can not be successfully completed). Anyway, it is better to know in advance what errors should be avoided when backing up, so we present to your attention eleven errors when creating a backup . This is not even so much an error as advice and a list of strategies that should not be used (first of all, for Mac users). Welcome under cat.
In a recent post, Backblaze shows the data of the annual survey, which showed that only 8% of respondents make backup copies every day (a couple of years ago this figure was higher), 16% make a backup once a year, and 25% do not do it at all. At the beginning of the summer, we also conducted a survey , the results of which are no less frightening - 90.6% of respondents are not ready to lose data, while only 74% of respondents make backup copies of important data (of which 57.9% use only an external drive for this).
Doing nothing is one of the worst approaches. You hope that regardless of your (or outsiders) actions, everything will work perfectly, but no computer can guarantee you this - sooner or later you will lose data and regret it.
')
If you accidentally deleted a file from your MacBook, there is a chance that it can be restored using special data recovery software. If this could not be done (for example, if the drive itself was damaged), then there is only hope for specialized data recovery companies. However, to believe that you can use one of these methods is simply stupid. Sometimes the cause of data loss is theft or unscheduled meteor shower, with the result that you simply will not have a disk on which you could perform all the above operations.
Indeed, some applications automatically save documents, giving you the opportunity to start from where you left off, even if the file was never saved with a name (an example of such an application is BBEdit). However, not all applications work in this way. But even if they work, there are always situations when users accidentally or mistakenly delete autosave files. It’s no secret that most backup systems assume that the user will at least save and name the file — autosave is often enabled only after this step.
There are many people who back up the entire system (or at least part of the files) whenever they like, creating clones or copying files to another disk manually. Of course, this is better than nothing, but this is a very unreliable and inconstant approach - there are a thousand and one reason not to make a backup once. And according to the law of meanness, it may well happen that you lose data on the very day when you forget or do not have time to perform a backup. Therefore, automatic backups are a more reliable option. Perhaps even the best.
Time Machine is a great (free) tool built into OS X - Apple made a sure bet to simplify the backup procedure. Time Machine is good . But do not fully trust this application. For example, in the article “ Why I don’t rely on Time Machine ” (“Why I don’t trust Time Machine”), the author tells how he encountered an unrecoverable Time Machine error, as a result of which he had to clean all backup disks and start copying everything again . The disks were fine, but the data was not. Even the vaunted recovery tools did not help. Time Machine can work ideally for years, but it costs him to stumble at least once ... Although Time Machine is a reliable utility (and copes well with its work as an auxiliary backup tool), it is better not to bet only on it.
One more thing about Time Machine: if the entire disk “flew”, then the only way out would be to format it or replace it and then restore the backup - this process can take many hours. During the procedure, you will not be able to use your Mac, so we strongly recommend making bootable copies of the system or "clones." But this leads to another problem ...
Clones are a great thing. If something went wrong, they let you go back to work almost instantly (reboot the system, hold Option, and select a clone). Also, the clones provide an opportunity to roll back the system to previous versions of OS X, if the update has passed with errors.
The problem is that clones do not allow you to restore accidentally deleted files or access their earlier versions if the clone has been updated (some applications provide file archiving capabilities, but you need to understand what you are doing). Another problem is that the clone is stored on your MacBook, so if something happens to the computer (tornado, robbery), then the only backup will be lost with it. This problem leads us to the following conclusion ...
A hypothetical meteorite can destroy a house in California, but it is unlikely to be able to simultaneously destroy the CrashPlan data center in Minnesota and other places where you can store your data. This also applies to data lost as a result of theft, pipe bursting, fire — misfortunes are much more likely than a meteorite fall. If your backups are stored on a local machine, then they are protected only from a certain range of hazards. This problem can be easily solved simply by giving backups to a friend or, for example, placing them in a bank cell. You can also use cloud services like CrashPlan , Backblaze or DollyDrive . In short, make sure you have a backup on the side.
But, oddly enough, the converse is also true. Not worth it ...
They are ideally suited for a huge number of situations, only the restoration of a multi-gigabyte piece of data from the cloud storage (let us forget about the whole disk so far) can take a long time. In such a situation, you are limited by the bandwidth of the ISP's communication channel. And some providers still have a limit of downloadable data, so the recovery procedure can be solidly delayed. That is why, in addition to "cloud", you should always keep local backups (of course, if you want to boot from a clone, it should be on your local hard drive).
The following two errors also apply to online backups.
Dropbox is an excellent and very convenient tool, although many other cloud storages (iCloud Drive, Box, Amazon Cloud Drive, Google Drive, Yandex.Disk, Microsoft OneDrive, etc.) have approximately the same set of functions. Most of them even offer a primitive backup function that restores old or deleted files (if they are not more than a month old).
All this is good, however, such services are more suitable for storing a small number of files, rather than for a full backup of the system or the entire disk. In addition, in most services free space is rather modest in size, while additional space for storing large amounts of data will be a regular and tangible item of expenses.
Do you use Google Docs, Office 365, iWork for iCloud or other web applications (of which there are countless) to create and share documents? Many of us use these services, at least occasionally. This is good, but do you make local copies of these documents? If the answer is no, then that's bad.
You can list a lot of cases when people opened Google Docs (or something else) and found that an important document disappeared for no apparent reason. And what to do in such a situation is not clear. Such situations occur infrequently, but believe me, they arise. You should not expect that the cloud service will adequately recover the lost data, or that you will be able to do it yourself (even if you have data in the cloud, you will not always be able to access it because of problems with the server or with your Internet connection, and it will happen at the most inopportune moment). Therefore, it is better to make your own backups of cloud documents. You can use special utilities, for example, CloudPull (see the article “ Back Up Your Google Data with CloudPull ” (“Backing up Google documents with CloudPull”), although it is already old).
RAID combines multiple hard drives into one logical volume. One option for configuring RAID is mirrored RAID (RAID 1), which is most often confused with backups. The essence of RAID 1 is that each block is written to two different physical disks, thereby providing 100% redundancy (RAID 5 and 6 also provide redundancy, but in other ways). This is not exactly cloning, because the data is always up-to-date and updated. Is it great?
In fact, not always. It is constant updates that are part of the problem. If you accidentally delete a file, it will be removed from both mirrored RAID disks. If a directory or file was damaged, a virus got to you, or there was some other problem, it will affect both drives equally. Of course, if the array was stolen or damaged, the files will be lost. RAID 1 protects your data only if one of the hard drives fails (this happens) and nothing more. So remember that a disk array is not a synonym for backup.
It's great if, while reading this list of ridiculous errors, you were convinced that your data backup strategy is perfect and devoid of the described shortcomings. If so, we hope you were interested in looking at how the rest 92% of the population live.
However, if you recognize yourself in at least one of the points, do not be in a hurry to get upset - we just did this post to help you fix it. We all went through it. You need to understand the mistakes and correct them, especially when it comes to the safety of important data. Just make a backup copy right now, after reading the article, taking into account the errors mentioned above - after that you can be sure that no meteorites will destroy your data, and you will be able to direct efforts to more important tasks, for example, to protect against zombies :)
This article is a translation of the foreign article " 11 stupid strategies of backup ", the author of which has nothing to do with our company. However, we decided to publish it when we caught ourselves thinking that our new products (represented by Acronis True Image 2016 and Acronis True Image Cloud ) allow us to backup data taking into account all the above tips and recommendations. In the near foreseeable future, we will prepare reviews of our new products, but for now you can study them yourself - according to a detailed review in Hacker magazine or by downloading applications from the site.
Well, yes, back up your important data right now. Successes!
1. It is impossible not to do backups
In a recent post, Backblaze shows the data of the annual survey, which showed that only 8% of respondents make backup copies every day (a couple of years ago this figure was higher), 16% make a backup once a year, and 25% do not do it at all. At the beginning of the summer, we also conducted a survey , the results of which are no less frightening - 90.6% of respondents are not ready to lose data, while only 74% of respondents make backup copies of important data (of which 57.9% use only an external drive for this).
Doing nothing is one of the worst approaches. You hope that regardless of your (or outsiders) actions, everything will work perfectly, but no computer can guarantee you this - sooner or later you will lose data and regret it.
')
2. Do not rely on data recovery tools and services.
If you accidentally deleted a file from your MacBook, there is a chance that it can be restored using special data recovery software. If this could not be done (for example, if the drive itself was damaged), then there is only hope for specialized data recovery companies. However, to believe that you can use one of these methods is simply stupid. Sometimes the cause of data loss is theft or unscheduled meteor shower, with the result that you simply will not have a disk on which you could perform all the above operations.
3. Do not rely on autosave
Indeed, some applications automatically save documents, giving you the opportunity to start from where you left off, even if the file was never saved with a name (an example of such an application is BBEdit). However, not all applications work in this way. But even if they work, there are always situations when users accidentally or mistakenly delete autosave files. It’s no secret that most backup systems assume that the user will at least save and name the file — autosave is often enabled only after this step.
4. Do not make backups manually
There are many people who back up the entire system (or at least part of the files) whenever they like, creating clones or copying files to another disk manually. Of course, this is better than nothing, but this is a very unreliable and inconstant approach - there are a thousand and one reason not to make a backup once. And according to the law of meanness, it may well happen that you lose data on the very day when you forget or do not have time to perform a backup. Therefore, automatic backups are a more reliable option. Perhaps even the best.
5. You can not rely only on Time Machine
Time Machine is a great (free) tool built into OS X - Apple made a sure bet to simplify the backup procedure. Time Machine is good . But do not fully trust this application. For example, in the article “ Why I don’t rely on Time Machine ” (“Why I don’t trust Time Machine”), the author tells how he encountered an unrecoverable Time Machine error, as a result of which he had to clean all backup disks and start copying everything again . The disks were fine, but the data was not. Even the vaunted recovery tools did not help. Time Machine can work ideally for years, but it costs him to stumble at least once ... Although Time Machine is a reliable utility (and copes well with its work as an auxiliary backup tool), it is better not to bet only on it.
One more thing about Time Machine: if the entire disk “flew”, then the only way out would be to format it or replace it and then restore the backup - this process can take many hours. During the procedure, you will not be able to use your Mac, so we strongly recommend making bootable copies of the system or "clones." But this leads to another problem ...
6. Do not use only clones
Clones are a great thing. If something went wrong, they let you go back to work almost instantly (reboot the system, hold Option, and select a clone). Also, the clones provide an opportunity to roll back the system to previous versions of OS X, if the update has passed with errors.
The problem is that clones do not allow you to restore accidentally deleted files or access their earlier versions if the clone has been updated (some applications provide file archiving capabilities, but you need to understand what you are doing). Another problem is that the clone is stored on your MacBook, so if something happens to the computer (tornado, robbery), then the only backup will be lost with it. This problem leads us to the following conclusion ...
7. You can not store backups on the same machine
A hypothetical meteorite can destroy a house in California, but it is unlikely to be able to simultaneously destroy the CrashPlan data center in Minnesota and other places where you can store your data. This also applies to data lost as a result of theft, pipe bursting, fire — misfortunes are much more likely than a meteorite fall. If your backups are stored on a local machine, then they are protected only from a certain range of hazards. This problem can be easily solved simply by giving backups to a friend or, for example, placing them in a bank cell. You can also use cloud services like CrashPlan , Backblaze or DollyDrive . In short, make sure you have a backup on the side.
But, oddly enough, the converse is also true. Not worth it ...
8. ... have only online backups
They are ideally suited for a huge number of situations, only the restoration of a multi-gigabyte piece of data from the cloud storage (let us forget about the whole disk so far) can take a long time. In such a situation, you are limited by the bandwidth of the ISP's communication channel. And some providers still have a limit of downloadable data, so the recovery procedure can be solidly delayed. That is why, in addition to "cloud", you should always keep local backups (of course, if you want to boot from a clone, it should be on your local hard drive).
The following two errors also apply to online backups.
9. Do not use exclusively Dropbox (or similar services)
Dropbox is an excellent and very convenient tool, although many other cloud storages (iCloud Drive, Box, Amazon Cloud Drive, Google Drive, Yandex.Disk, Microsoft OneDrive, etc.) have approximately the same set of functions. Most of them even offer a primitive backup function that restores old or deleted files (if they are not more than a month old).
All this is good, however, such services are more suitable for storing a small number of files, rather than for a full backup of the system or the entire disk. In addition, in most services free space is rather modest in size, while additional space for storing large amounts of data will be a regular and tangible item of expenses.
10. Do not think that web applications do not need backups.
Do you use Google Docs, Office 365, iWork for iCloud or other web applications (of which there are countless) to create and share documents? Many of us use these services, at least occasionally. This is good, but do you make local copies of these documents? If the answer is no, then that's bad.
You can list a lot of cases when people opened Google Docs (or something else) and found that an important document disappeared for no apparent reason. And what to do in such a situation is not clear. Such situations occur infrequently, but believe me, they arise. You should not expect that the cloud service will adequately recover the lost data, or that you will be able to do it yourself (even if you have data in the cloud, you will not always be able to access it because of problems with the server or with your Internet connection, and it will happen at the most inopportune moment). Therefore, it is better to make your own backups of cloud documents. You can use special utilities, for example, CloudPull (see the article “ Back Up Your Google Data with CloudPull ” (“Backing up Google documents with CloudPull”), although it is already old).
11. Do not think that RAID and backup are synonymous
RAID combines multiple hard drives into one logical volume. One option for configuring RAID is mirrored RAID (RAID 1), which is most often confused with backups. The essence of RAID 1 is that each block is written to two different physical disks, thereby providing 100% redundancy (RAID 5 and 6 also provide redundancy, but in other ways). This is not exactly cloning, because the data is always up-to-date and updated. Is it great?
In fact, not always. It is constant updates that are part of the problem. If you accidentally delete a file, it will be removed from both mirrored RAID disks. If a directory or file was damaged, a virus got to you, or there was some other problem, it will affect both drives equally. Of course, if the array was stolen or damaged, the files will be lost. RAID 1 protects your data only if one of the hard drives fails (this happens) and nothing more. So remember that a disk array is not a synonym for backup.
Do normally - it will be normal!
It's great if, while reading this list of ridiculous errors, you were convinced that your data backup strategy is perfect and devoid of the described shortcomings. If so, we hope you were interested in looking at how the rest 92% of the population live.
However, if you recognize yourself in at least one of the points, do not be in a hurry to get upset - we just did this post to help you fix it. We all went through it. You need to understand the mistakes and correct them, especially when it comes to the safety of important data. Just make a backup copy right now, after reading the article, taking into account the errors mentioned above - after that you can be sure that no meteorites will destroy your data, and you will be able to direct efforts to more important tasks, for example, to protect against zombies :)
Announcement
This article is a translation of the foreign article " 11 stupid strategies of backup ", the author of which has nothing to do with our company. However, we decided to publish it when we caught ourselves thinking that our new products (represented by Acronis True Image 2016 and Acronis True Image Cloud ) allow us to backup data taking into account all the above tips and recommendations. In the near foreseeable future, we will prepare reviews of our new products, but for now you can study them yourself - according to a detailed review in Hacker magazine or by downloading applications from the site.
Well, yes, back up your important data right now. Successes!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/272133/
All Articles