One major source of procrastination in the area of backing up personal or business data stems from creating a complex mental picture in one’s mind of what you think you have to do: Buy a stack of rewriteable CD’S, label them, buy the best Backup Software, run through an inventory of your complete hard drive, in order to determine what to back up.

Just take some kind of action - doing this is so much more important than trying to be Captain Organized. Write down 5 things you do with your PC that results in crucial files you would never want to lose. This is your first micro-step. You’re now done with the first portion of this task and you can reward yourself.

The next step is to find some empty space on a second hard drive (this is definitely preferred to having a diskette, and second hard drives are cheap). Create a folder on this physically separate hard drive and name this folder: "Email Backup". (this is one of the five things above that you discovered you wouldn’t want to lose)

You now have a dedicated place to back up your email files (in the case of Outlook, for instance, this would be *.PST). Now Google for "XCOPY" and Batch File, and use that information to write yourself a simple *.bat file that copies your email files to that folder at least weekly. Your reward at this point can be more extravagant.

You’re basically done with a minimalist backup solution for now - you can then add additional Xcopy commands for other very important key files.

Don’t go drawing the conclusion that the perfect and responsible backup system has to necessarily involve a complete backing up of all software on a hard drive. The files that you create, with your mind and your time, are the crucial types of information you want to back up, and back up now. Not ZIP files of old teleseminar MP3 files you’ve already listened to.

Your List of Important Files May Include The Following

If you’re a developer and spent hours on a single source file containing Java or C, I don’t have to remind you of the need for the slightest move toward a responsible routine of backing up (if you’re not already doing this or using a source control system).

The minor task of making duplicates of important files to another hard drive or a diskette that you leave sitting around may not necessarily help in the event of theft or fire; however, even taking this simple action of making a copy has personally helped me in instances such as this:

- I once accidentally clicked the wrong button in WS FTP and copied over changes to a local file instead of uploading this file. No problem - I had a copy of that file in a dedicated backup folder on my second hard drive. This is one of the "Overlooked reasons" mentioned in the title… simple user error that happens to everyone with a devastating result - not a hardware crash or incidence of theft.

In summary, think:

Small and Important Files Regularly Backed Up Now.

Prevention Is Easy When All You’ve Got To Do is Copy A File. The rest can come later.

Don’t revert to Perfectionism Mode and then start searching in Google or Yahoo after reading this article, for more info on backing up Outlook or something similar. You will inevitably come across commercial applications that promise to "revolutionize the way all of your software works" - you’re already distracted at this point and the odds are that you won’t get to your non-Email related files I mentioned above, such as important spreadsheet documents, and other files listed above.

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Steve Bailey has enjoyed working in the I.T. field, whether as an employee or independently, since the late 80’s. For software-related articles, tutorials and reviews, visit his site. Also, available, is a notification sign-up form for free ftp program.

** Attn Ezine editors / Site owners Feel free to reprint this article in its entirety in your ezine provided that all content/links are are left intact.

· Definition of Data Recovery

The salvaging of lost data or making available the previously damaged data stored on various damaged media such as hard disk drives, magnetic tapes, magnetic disks, zip disks, CD-Rom, flash cards and other storage media is known as Data recovery. For example the data of a file which has been deleted by some accident can be recovered again.

· Data Recovery Service Providers

There are various Data Recovery Service Providers who are working for 24/7 in order to provide their customers with the best available data recovery services. These service providers have highly trained staff and they are continuously improving the process technology and their quality systems. These providers allow their customers to recover every important piece of data from all the popular file systems in case of accidental file deletion, malfunctioning of software, formatted hard drives, damaged or deleted partitions and erased or corrupted by a virus.

These data recovery service providers offer a complete range of solutions for the restoration of lost data. The different software used by these providers are compatible for all the Microsoft Windows Editions, Apple Macintosh, Sun Solaris, AIX, Linux and Unix operating system. They also provide data recovery from different file systems such as FAT, NTFS, HFS, HFS+, NWFS, EXT2 and EXT3 file systems. They prevent the various important data of our computer by different data safety and data security softwares from unwanted accessing of data, corruption, modification or deletion by another user or from various harmful programs such as viruses, spy ware, Trojan horses, etc.

· Some common Software used in Data Recovery

There are different data safety and data recovery software for hard drive data recovery. Some common software used in Data recovery are mentioned bellow.

Data Recovery with Fire: The FIRE is a portable bootable cdrom based software which can provide an immediate environment to perform data recovery which includes different forensic analysis, virus scanning, incident response and vulnerability assessment.

Data Recovery with LDE: The LDE or the Linux Disc Editor was originally made to recover the deleted files in Linux. The simple curses interface of the LDE resembles very much to the old version of Norton Disk Editor for DOS.

NT Data Recovery: The NT Data Recovery software provides read access to the NTFS drives in the MS DOS environment. The functionality of this software includes support for files with long names and as well as compressed and fragmented files. The NTFS Reader for DOS allows the files to copy them from NTFS to FAT volumes in network drives.

Data Recovery with PC Inspector: The PC Inspector File Recovery software is compatible for NTFS and FAT file systems. It has the capability to recover files with the original date and time stamp and can also restore them to the network drive. They can also recover many lost files even when the header entry is not available. The software can find partitions automatically on FAT systems even if the boot area/sector has been damaged or erased. The PC Inspector File Recovery software offers a user friendly interface that scans the hard drives and automatically recovers the files from the deleted folders.

Tyson J Stevenson writes on a wide variety of business related subjects,most often with valuable news & reviews. Expect to see his name often.

A related resource is Recover Data

Further information can be found at HubbuH

Picture the scene, its Monday morning and you’ve traversed the morning rush hour and arrived at the office only to find a disaster zone. Over the weekend the office has experienced a fire that has all but destroyed the premises. IT, key documents, plant and machinery – gone – what are you going to do?

Ok so this may be an extreme example but it happens. Disasters and accidents happen every day and affect many businesses some of which fail to recover – don’t put yourself in this situation.

For many businesses and their managers disaster recovery planning never cross their minds, businesses carry out their usual day to day activity unaware of what could happen if disaster struck, but there are some fundamentals that you should consider. The first of which is a disaster recover plan.

The disaster recovery plan should describe how your business will cope in the case of an emergency, what actions will be undertaken and who will co-ordinate them. But what things should go into a plan? In our checklist below we describe some of the things to consider.

Disaster Recovery Checklist.

1. Analyze your business

What systems can be down for what period of time before serious consequences occur. For example if your ERP system goes down and you can’t process sales what’s the impact? With a subjective view you’ll probably find that you can manage without some systems for a while (perhaps upto a week) with other’s you’ll need them back up again as soon as possible. Develop some computer failure procedures to manage your key business activity when IT is unavailable – make sure that copies of these processes are included in the plan.

2. Identify possible risks

Examples of risks to your business include the loss of IT systems, loss of buildings or plant/machinery etc. Detail some mitigation in your recovery plan. For example if you don’t have access to your office in the event of a disaster is there other business premises/temporary accommodation that you can use? If so list appropriate telephone numbers as part of the plan.

3. Recovery team

Put together a recovery team with clear lines of authorization who are responsible for co-ordinating activity in case of disaster. They should be responsible for maintaining your disaster recovery plan and meet on a regular basis to ensure that the plan is still relevant and accurate.

4. Backup your IT systems

Ensure that you backup your IT systems at suitably regular intervals (and test the recovery process!!!) Make sure that any backup tapes/CD’s are stored off site or in a fire proof safe. Make sure the recovery process is documented in your Disaster recovery plan.

5. Inventory your key equipment

Keep an inventory of crucial capital equipment and machinery so that it’s easily identified and replaceable if needs arise. Keep a record of suitable suppliers and contact numbers so that you can use them in an emergency.

6. Identify any external risks

For example if a business partner (perhaps a key supplier?) suffers a disaster what is the impact on your business and how would you mitigate it?

7. Don’t forget the paper

Too many businesses focus their disaster recovery plans purely on IT – don’t forget the impact a loss of paper records may have. How would you manage if all your paper documents are destroyed.

Above all else think about it! – Accidents and emergencies do happen but providing you plan for it and have suitable back up plans and arrangements you’re business need not suffer.

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