BACKUP!!
Don’t click away! I’m not going to nag you (well, not much, anyway) to do your backups. I’ve already done that. This (like the previous case) will give you some practical solutions to make sure that you DO YOUR BACKUP!
Oops. Sorry to shout.
In the first episode of BACKUP ( https://gerald-hornsby.com/blog/2024/06/09/day-7-monthofblogging-june2024-monthofwriting/ ), I talked about the reasons we need to backup our data. In the second episode ( https://gerald-hornsby.com/blog/2024/06/15/day-14-monthofblogging-june2024-monthofwriting/ ), I described my file naming convention, which means I have a series of fresh files throughout the project, ensuring that if something disastrous happens to my work file, I have a file that’s (at most) 1 day old.
In this episode, I’m going to talk about where you back up your data to. Where do you put the copies of the files for safekeeping?
1) The first, and easiest, and one I mentioned before, is to email a copy of your file to yourself. It really is quick (I’ve just done it, and it takes 10 seconds, maybe less). It’s easy. It’s free. Just think that there will be a nice, safe file somewhere in the cloud which you can access from anywhere in the world. Neat, huh? You should be doing this at least once per day.
2) Use USB ‘thumb’ sticks. These are huge nowadays for very little money. £10 will buy you 32GB of safe storage. You can buy them from supermarkets. for goodness’ sake! Buy one with your weekly shopping. Tell you what – buy two. Alternate between them. I back up the files I’m working on (sometimes the whole of a project folder) at least once per week. And make sure you don’t leave them with the laptop. I have two memory sticks which attach to my set of keys. When I’m out of the house, so are my keys, and so are my important files.
That is such a brilliant idea, I should be selling these tips.
3) Use external USB hard disks. These are relatively cheap now. I can buy a 2TB (terabyte) external drive for less than £50. Yes! Two thousand gigabytes! And it’s a good one, at that. You can afford to back up your whole writing folder whilst you’re having lunch or something. And, while you’re investing in security, buy a second USB hard disk, too. Alternate big backups, but give one to a neighbour. Theft or fire could destroy your precious backups. Thousands of pounds- worth of work is at risk if you don’t look after your computer files.
So, just a short post today. It’s not like I’m going to labour the point, is it?
DO YOUR BACKUPS, NOW!