- Getting Acquainted with Unity
- Using Applications
- Using Ubuntu in Your Language
- Configuring a Printer
- Keeping Your Computer Updated
- Adding and Removing Programs and Packages
- Upgrading to the Next Ubuntu Release
- Ubuntu and Multimedia
- Backing Up
- Customizing Ubuntu?s Look and Feel
- Unity in Other Devices
- Summary
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Backing Up
Everyone who has used a computer for any length of time has heard the advice, “Back up, back up often, test the backups, repeat.” Few people actu ally follow this advice, but ignoring it is dangerous and can cause the loss of important documents, files, pictures, and more.
To prevent this loss, prudent computer users, regardless of which operating system they use, pick a method of copying their files to a safe location for storage and use that method on a regular basis. To help you devise the strategy that best suits you, we have come up with a few options to consider. This topic is a big one, and how you deal with it is a very personal decision. Rather than give step-by-step instructions, we mention a few options to consider and leave it to you to research them further and decide on one that looks appropriate and inviting.
Some users find that the easiest thing for them to do is buy an external hard drive and copy all of their files to it every week or two. Others look at this and think to themselves, “There has to be a better way.” Perhaps they noticed that these methods require every single file to be copied every time, even if the file has not changed in ages. In these cases, an incremental backup is ideal, where the computer is told to compare the files in the original location with stored files in a backup location (like an external hard drive) and copy only new or changed files.
Several GUI programs for backing up are available from the Ubuntu repositories. Each comes with a basic and useful graphic interface that is easy to figure out and use, and each can be configured to allow you to do full or incremental backups. A backup program is installed by default and can be found by searching for backups in the Dash. The program lets you configure automatic or manual backups, specify the location for those backups, specify what will be backed up, set scheduling for automatic backups, restore files from the backup, and more (Figure 3-22).
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Figure 3-22 The main Backups settings window
For those users who are a little more advanced (or a little braver) and who love the raw power available from a command-line program, the best two programs for backups are rar and rsync, which are both available from the Ubuntu repositories. Once they are installed, you can read the manual pages and learn how to use them by typing man rar or man rsync from a terminal. Although rar and rsync are complicated, they are also fast and amazingly effective at both making the backups and restoring them.
Unfortunately, this quick mention in a small section of a very diverse chapter can merely get you thinking about the need for good backups and help guide you in your search for the perfect method for you. However you decide to back up your data, we strongly encourage you not to ignore the need to do so, but rather to find a way that works for you. If you have any questions about this or other topics, the Ubuntu community has a large number of very helpful people you can ask for advice, and we recommend you start by searching or asking questions in Ask Ubuntu at http://askubuntu.com.