It bears repeating…

By Rick Blechta

Yesterday’s post by Douglas concerning the perils of technology got me thinking.

Since the early days of “personal computers” (remember that term?), I’ve used these sometimes frustrating contraptions quite a lot for work. Early on, I used them to write arrangements for my students. It was far easier and convenient and when the little so-and-sos lost their music — a frequent occurrence — I could just print out another copy.

Later on, when I transitioned into full-time graphic design, I had to use computers because, well, no one did anything by hand anymore. Again they sped up the process and made complicated things easy. Plus, when the inevitable changes came in from clients, it was easy and quick to pivot in the required new direction. Seriously, I can’t imagine doing graphic design work without using a computer.

Along the way, I learned a bit about how these exceptionally complicated — and getting moreso all the time — machines worked.

The heart of any computer is storage of all work done using it. If one can’t recall their work, a computer is useless.

It’s also one of the weakest points. If the computational part of your computer breaks down, you can get it fixed. However, if the storage part craps out, well, to put it succinctly (and somewhat crudely), you’re screwed. In certain situations files can be retrieved, but let me assure you, it can be a very expensive process running into the several thousands of dollars.

If you use a computer to store your writing (or anything you do), you need to understand that it’s not a matter of if the storage device (generally a hard drive) will break, it’s when — because they all break down eventually.

I’ve written about this here on Type M before, so today I’m just reminding everyone — back up your work to multiple locations! Make it part of your daily workday. I have two storage hard drives containing my files and I also use offsite storage. I felt very smug about my two hard drives until a graphic design friend asked, “And what if your house burns down?”

Whether you’re a writer or not, you don’t want to lose files, period. There’s nothing more disheartening to hear of a colleague who didn’t take adequate precautions and lost precious (sometimes) months of hard work to the computer demons.

I heard of a writer who lost his entire manuscript of his just-completed novel when his hard drive died. He had to go back and rewrite the whole darn book.

Don’t be like him. Back up religiously to multiple locations every day!

A public service announcement!

by Rick Blechta

Aline’s computer debacle last week put me in mind of something anyone with a computer should know about and guard against, and it is this: you must always protect your data! It’s not if any hard drive you use will fail, but when. Do not ever think this won’t happen to you. It will — and usually at the worst time.

Computers are very complex machines, and like any machine, they will eventually fail. As expensive as having the motherboard on your computer going down can be, they can be fixed or replaced, and you’ll soon be up and running again. This is not the case with a hard drive failure. They usually can’t be fixed if the problem involves the discs on which your data is stored. To extract this data using heroic methods professionals have can be horrendously expensive — if it can be done at all.

But since hard drives can last for a long time, we’re often lulled into a false sense of security so we either don’t back up our data as often as we should — or we stop altogether. Trust me. Eventually it will come back to haunt you.

I speak from experience. I use three back-up systems, but a few days ago, I got bitten. The main storage disc (Time Machine on my Mac) got corrupted and could not be fixed. It had to be erased and re-initialized. While I didn’t actually lose any files, I did lose the history of those files, meaning I could no longer access past iterations of a job I was working and find something I’d discarded a couple of weeks ago. It wasn’t catastrophic but it was a pain in the butt and involved several hours of needless toil.

For those of us who write, you must always protect your work with back-ups. I’m sure most of us do, but even so things can go wrong. You must always plan for the worst. Maybe you religiously back up on your computer with files kept on two different hard drives. The chances of both of them going down at the same time is minuscule, right? Well, what are you going to do if your house burns down? Both hard drives could likely be lost.

So here’s my suggestion to be as fail-safe as possible. By all means keep two copies of your precious work-in-progress, but also utilize a back-up assuring your work is stored away from your house. The easiest way to do that is to pay for some sort of cloud storage. This option is not necessarily expensive. Some small storage options are even free. (They give you a small amount of free storage space in hopes that you’ll buy a more generous option, usually at a good price.) Many can even be programmed to back-up automatically. Set it and forget it — and it will be there if you ever really need it.

It’s heart-breaking to hear of someone who has lost months of work because they neglected to take adequate precautions. Do yourself a favour and think about how you’re currently doing things. If the worst happened, would you still be able to carry on, or would you have to start all over again?

If that’s the case, then heed my warning. I’d hate to be the one to say, “I told you so.”