[H-GEN] DVD+RW media for backups

[Greg Black]

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On 2003-11-17, Jason Parker-Burlingham wrote:
> Greg Black <gjb at gbch.net> writes:
>> On 2003-11-17, Jason Parker-Burlingham wrote:
>>> Greg Black <gjb at gbch.net> writes:
>>>> On 2003-11-16, Jason Parker-Burlingham wrote:
> 
> Much as it pains me to say it, I think my backups aren't that
> important to me yet,

I'm surprised, but you know what you have.  In the cases I was
discussing, both my wife and I would be devastated if we lost
our computer-stored data, as would my sister and her partner.

> although this conversation *is* making me think
> that I should probably print out copies of the important little notes
> I take from time to time.

I used to print quite a bit of stuff, and found that comforting
and helpful -- but it really sucks if there is any significant
quantity (where that's defined on the basis of what you would
find painful to have to type).

>>>> So I use hardware that's well away from leading edge (but still
>>>> nicely current) and I use the software that I developed over some
>>>> years and which hasn't changed for at least fifteen years.
>>> Nice.  How many lines of code?
>> Six shell scripts totalling 1486 lines (of which 915 are code);
>> one (rarely-used) C program of 75 lines of code; three man pages
>> with 560 lines (in source form).
> 
> Probably less C code than I expected.  And the man pages are a great
> idea.

In the beginning, there was more C; but I made a deliberate
decision to switch as much as possible to portable shell scripts
and am glad of that.  If I do have to go back and see what is
happening inside code that's decades old, I can unravel it
faster if it's a script.

I have recently decided to encrypt the data as it goes to tape
and that will require a few lines of C, but should not be at all
complex to add to the mix -- the tricky part, as always, is to
dream up methods to test it that really do prove that you can do
what you need to do.

I sometimes surprise myself and write man pages for internal
software -- I think the impetus comes from situations where it's
clear that having to read the code every time I want to know how
to do something is more painful than taking the time, once, to
write the man page.  It's more likely to happen for software
that I expect to be in use for ever and where the circumstances
that will involve looking stuff up are likely to be well apart.

>> And, just for interest, the latest SAGE News Summary (Volume 2,
>> Number 39 of November 17, 2003) just arrived and has this item:
> 
> Heh, we just referenced the same study.  (And the SAGE News Summary is
> excellent.  Rob Kolstad is always looking for contributors!)

I've contributed code in response to some of Rob's requests, but
I never get around to contributing to the other things.  Maybe
one day ...

>> Well, I hope I've encouraged you to re-consider optical rotating
>> media in the light of reliability concerns; and to re-consider
>> tapes in the light of the true value of backups versus the cost.
> 
> I think the current regime won't last more than a few months.  By then
> a real tape unit will certainly be on the cards.

I must say I'm pleased to hear that; I'll be interested to hear
about your subsequent steps.

> jason, still looking into his options for storing full and incremental
>        backups sensibly and cost-effectively on this media

I'm sorry for distracting you (and possibly other contributors
to this thread) from the important point, even though I thought
the stuff I said was important.  Since I haven't even tried to
do it this way, I have nothing useful to say on this.

Cheers, Greg

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