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IN THIS ISSUE:
Editor's Notes
Inspirational Quotes
Feature Article
Learning From Our Mistakes
Great Sites
Advertising
Shameless Self-Promotion
Feedback
Subscribe/Unsubscribe Instructions
After a major computer problem wiped out the mailing list
for this newsletter in January, the past few months have
been a time for regrouping and learning from my mistakes.
In this issue you will find an article with all the details
of what went wrong and what we can all learn from the
experience. If you have any comments or suggestions, please
pass them along.
Recently I moved this list to Yahoo! Groups. The main
reason for this was to avoid any future problems with the
maintenace of the list. I would appreciate any feedback
concerning this move.
About-the-web.com is a resource for new users to the
Internet. Our mission is to provide newcomers a place to
learn about browsers, e-mail programs, search engines,
making money, avoiding scams, creating and promoting web
sites, and some simple tips for a better web surfing
experience. More advanced users will find useful links to
other sites.
We welcome your comments, questions and suggestions. We
also welcome any tips, tricks or great web sites that you
would like to share. Send me an e-mail and we'll publish
all the most relevant ones in this newsletter.
Welcome to the fifth issue of What's New About-the-Web! We
intend that you find this newsletter interesting and
inspiring. Please pass it along to a friend.
There I was, merrily surfing along the Information
Superhighway, when my computer froze. Not an unusual
circumstance, unfortunately, just a typical annoyance of
the computer age. So I restarted my computer and waited for
the familiar desktop to reappear. But this time, it didn't
happen the way it usually does. Instead I got some cryptic
error, something about zero sector, and so I tried to
restart the computer again.
I said a faint prayer while the computer did its restart
thing, and again I got the strange error message. "Oh no!"
I exclaimed, or something similar, "I wonder what the
problem is". I tried again, this time with a more fervent
prayer and my fingers crossed and chanting "third times a
charm". Still no luck, the computer definitely had a
problem.
So I dug out my disk repair utility and put it to work,
checking for disk problems, etc. It reported that, yes,
there was a problem which perhaps it could fix. So it tried
and I restarted the "poor old computer" one more time. Still
nothing. So I tried the disk repair utility again, and
again, and again. All the while I was getting more frantic
and upset. How could this happen to me? What could I do?
I began to think about all the files I'd created that I
hadn't bothered to backup. Then I realized that it had been
awhile since I backed anything up. I vaguely remembered
backing up a few important files a few weeks before and I
thought I remembered backing up most of my hard disk a few
months before that fateful day.
I finally broke down and started consulting manuals. I
checked connections and tried a few things but still
without any success. I tried calling a friend that knows a
lot about computers. He wasn't much help either.
Slowly I came to the realization that I might have to
reformat my hard disk, destroying all the files that were
on it. That meant that I would have to reinstall my
operating system and all my programs. Then I would need to
go through my backups and hope that my important files were
not so out of date as to be mostly worthless. I said another
prayer, tried my disk repair utility again, and then cursing
my misfortune, reformatted my drive.
The installation of the system software went smoothly and
so did reinstalling many of the programs that I had
installation disks for. However, many of the programs that
I had downloaded off the Internet, I didn't have any
backups for. Then I turned to my backup disks. Sure enough
there were some of the files that I had backed up a few
weeks before, but when I checked my main backup tapes, I
realized that it had been over a year since I had done a
full drive backup.
That meant that all my emails, all my web sites and all the
subscribers to my newsletter had gone to computer bit
heaven, never to be seen again. The file I had stored all
my passwords, etc. was woefully out of date and some of the
writing and programming I had been working on was now gone
as well.
Then the situation got even worse. My tape backup drive was
not working properly. I reinstalled drivers, etc., but it
wouldn't read my backup tape. So I made some calls, figured
out how to get the tape out of the drive at least and
discovered that it was now mangled. Fortunately, that last
time I had done a tape backup, I had made a second backup
tape, just in case something were to happen to the first
one. So I found a repair shop and send my drive off to be
fixed. Several days later, I got my drive back and was able
to restore a few things that were of minor value after being
stored for over a year.
Finally, I resolved, never to let more than a day or two go
by without backing up all my important files. I set up a set
of disks for this purpose and did a full drive backup on my
newly repaired tape drive. And each night I began to get
into the habit of backing everything up, so this terrible
loss will never happen again.
The moral of this story is "backup, backup, backup. If you
work on your computer every day like I do, you need to
backup every night. A good rule of thumb is to backup your
important files, not the programs which can be restored
from installation disks, but the actual files you spend so
much time creating, at least every eight hours or so. That
way, if your hard drive dies, the most of work you will
lose is just one day's worth.
In my case, I lost weeks and in some case months worth of
valuable time and work, including a very important list of
subscribers that I had spent over a year accumulating.
So, in addition to my tape backup, which I use to backup my
entire hard drive at least once a month, I have a set of
five zip disks which I backup my most important files to
every night. I keep duplicates of everything too, just in
case one of the disks fails for some reason. My actual
procedure is to have three disks with a similar directory
structure as my hard disk. On Monday and Thursday, I back
up to disk 1. On Tuesday and Friday I backup to disk 2 and
on Wednesday and Saturday, I backup to disk 3. I try not to
work on Sunday ;-).
I use a great program called Retrospect for my tape
backups. It keeps track of all the files that have been
modified since the last time I backed up and automatically
copies the newer files onto the tape. This is a great tie
saver.
If you work with very large files, zip disks may not hold
enough data to accommodate your needs. If this is the case,
or you just don't like zip disks for some reason, you can
also backup to other kinds of media including CD-RW disks.
You might also consider just buying another hard disk,
similar in size to your current one, and copy all your
important files to that disk periodically. This is a very
simple system, but may not be cost effective for many
people.
Do not backup to floppy disks. They are the most unreliable
media and hold relatively little data. CD's are probably the
safest media and hold quite a lot of data. Tape drives and
large hard drives hold the most amount of data, but are the
most expensive solutions.
Whichever method you choose, make sure you backup your
important files often. You might also consider buying a
fireproof safe to store your backups in or put them in a
safety deposit box or some other alternate location. That
way in the event of fire or flood, the odds are good that
your backups will be accessible.
(c) Copyright 2001, Garth Catterall-Heart. All rights
reserved. mailto:webmaster@about-the-web.com
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>>> Web Site Development, Production and Management In
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>>> Photography by Garth Catterall-Heart
If you're in the market for some photography, be sure to
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or just viewing on your computer.
"Great site! Perfect for beginners, like me! You just don't
know how useful a resource this site is going to be for me
in the future. It has answered loads of questions that I
had. Unfortunately I only have Kingston Interactive
Television internet service (set top box) at the moment,
so I can't really take full advantage of the net. I am
certain that by the time I can afford to fork out for a
decent pc with all the heavy stuff I will have learned
enough to take over the whole world. No seriosly, I will
definitely be recommending this site to all. Cheers." -
Andrew Whatmough
Thanks Andrew!
Let me know what you think about this newsletter, our web
site, or what topics would you like to see discussed,
either in this newsletter or on our web site. Just send me
an e-mail! Please!
Thanks for participating in this Internet experience!
