My grandfather had a saying when he was building something:

“Measure twice - cut once.”

Unfortunately, I did not inherit the carpenter genes, but the saying still holds true today - especially for those who are highly dependent on their computers. My grandchildren will remember the following sound advice from me:

“Backup.”

Okay, well - not exactly as clever as my grandfather’s advice, but no less important. And I have backups. Lots of backups - mostly of data, but also of source code. Generally not any backups of applications - those are easier to just re-install. I have 5 1/4 inch disks, 3 1/2 inch “floppies” (which are not exactly floppy), Zip disks, external hard drives, USB drives, CD ROMs and DVDs. So, I have followed my own advice - right? Well, sure - but if there is a house fire - guess how good those backups are going to be? I am going to guess - not very good.

Around the end of last year I decided to diversify my backup routine a little bit. I store some of my media backups at my sister’s house and make sure all my customers have copies of my work. A good start. Then I started to explore the online backup services. One service was free, so I tried that out. I works pretty well, but on one of my slower machines it took seemingly forever to do the initial backup. Of course I needed to re-boot for one reason or another - which required the backup to start over.

For my online backups, I don’t need a great deal of storage. What I need is something that will take care of the items I need most if I needed to bring a computer back to life from scratch. I think IBackup - Online Backup and Storage does exactly what I need in those situations. Being able to quickly and securely reconstitute my email archives is probably one of the most important capabilities I would need. Basically, you can setup IBackup like a mapped drive and copy files to it. I find myself needing to move files from one machine to another - on different networks. Before, I would upload the file to a FTP server and then download it at the other computer. On a Windows machine, IBackup makes the process a bit easier - even for the technical professional. Not to mention the insecurity of passwords when dealing with FTP.

So, remember: “Backup.” But, be smart about how you backup your resources. Use the right tools - CDs and DVDs are great for huge amounts of data - as are external drives. For your tactical day-to-day backups, a good online backup service like IBackup will probably fit the bill for most individuals and small businesses.