My Secure Backup: How to reduce your backup size

Transcription

1 My Secure Backup: How to reduce your backup size As time passes, we find our backups getting bigger and bigger, causing increased space charges. This paper takes a few Newsletter and other articles I've written and combines them into a complete "Do It Yourself" backup cleanup guide. Using this guide, you should be able to minimize your backup charges. I've written this so most of you can do it yourself, but of course, I'd be happy to work with you if you would rather not be bothered, or feel nervous doing it alone. There are 4 problems, which contribute to large backup size. First I will review each one so you understand what it is and why it exists. Then I will present a step by step guide to solving it. But first: How do you check the complete size of your backup? To see how much space you are using, for all the computers you back up and including your previous versions do this: Open the Secure Backup Activity Monitor, pull down the help menu and click the "Check Online Disk Consistency" This is a good thing to do monthly anyway. It checks your entire backup and makes sure it is consistent on the server. When the check is done (it can take a few minutes or longer) you'll need to double click on the results line as it tells you to.

2 Below the Consistency Check Complete line, you'll see the total directories, total files and total bytes in your backup. It will also tell you how much space you have in Backup vaults. These are the kind of backup we do not use, so it should be 0 as it is above. Problem 1. Files you deleted on your computer, remain on your backup Suppose you were to move some folders around in your documents folder, or some other folder which was getting backed up. For example, some work you were doing becomes a big project, so you move the files that were in you documents folder into a new folder for "Big Project." Now the backup will back them up again in the new location, but they will remain, needlessly in the old location. Or perhaps, you will import data into a new version of the program. Now, you have the old version and the new one. After you see everything is working fine, you delete the old files in the archaic format, forgetting that they continue to exist in your backup. Some program make backup copies automatically, either with your knowledge, or just for your safety without telling you. Commonly, they keep the previous 5 copies. You backup each night, copying both the original version, and the 5 backups. The program deletes the oldest file when the sixth one comes up, so you only have 5 copies on your computer. However, it doesn't know to delete the backups the computer is making from your Backup drive, so you end up with hundreds of these backup files in time. Mysecurebackup has a great and simple way to clean up these files. The reason this is unavoidable, is that if you deleted files by accident, then you don't

3 want MySecureBackup to delete the backup files, so we don't want the backup to delete the backup copies of files which were deleted from your computer. The backup program can be setup to do this, but I never do. Problem 2. You get a new computer. Now you have 2 backups, the old and the new with most of your data in both places! MySecureBackup has an good method for going into your backup with your browser and removing those files you don't need duplicated. Remember, they are on both computers and your new computer is being backed up. It is ok to remove some of those backup files from the old computer. Problem 3. You maintain 5 previous copies of changing files. Many times these previous versions become superfluous. Not only are some archive files superfluous, but sometimes MySecureBackup seems to think files have changed when they have merely been looked at, so multiple "previous" copies of files which are really, the same as the file you have backed up. This makes the archive superfluous. It makes sense to rummage through your archive a couple times a year and clean out the junk that accumulates. Problem 4. A backup was created by mistake. You'll want to check and make sure you haven't accidentally created an automatic backup that you don't want. Solving Problem 1. Files that you deleted on your computer, remain on your backup. MySecureBackup provides a simple procedure to remove any file on your backup that isn't on your computer. I do this at least once a month. Just open the activity monitor, choose Online Disk and then Legacy Backup Cleanup.

4 The program will scan through all your files and folders and then present a report like this: I always preview the files and directories it will delete from my backup. Then I select Yes and OK and delete them. Obviously you should do this when you are sure your computer is working properly, not after a major problem. Be aware that the cleanup process takes a surprisingly long time. It seems that for every file that needs to be deleted an instruction is sent, then the job is performed on your online backup, then confirmation is sent, then it is checked, then the instruction to delete the next file is sent. So lots of small files could take hours. Solving Problems 2 and 3. Removing old computer backups and old archives.

5 You can login to your backup using a network drive, but for cleanup purposes, logging in through your browser is best. Here's how: 1. Login using this link: Fill in OCS for the Domain and YOUR user name and Password. 2. The ~VersionArchive are your previous versions of files you have backed up under backups. Find the stuff you don't need and delete it.

6 Your account is shown, then your version archive for previous versions of files. Followed by backups for all the computers you are backing up. Then opening the backup shows the drive and file folders on the left and the files on the right. Your options are on top. Lost and Found is the place they have put odd files they can't figure out because there was some problem with the backup. Normally those can be removed. Remember, these actions take a long time. If you delete a folder with 10,000 files in it, it could take over an hour to send the 10,000 instructions to the MySecureBackup server and wait for the file to be deleted, then receive the confirmation back and update, then send the next instruction. BE PATIENT. Solving Problem 4: Deleting a backup that was created by mistake. Finally, MySecureBackup pushes their new "Automatic Backups". I don't like them and all of you are using "legacy backups." The automatic backups don't let you create a network drive and upload or download a single file. That is why I don't use them. But, I've seen them get created by mistake. Here's how to check. Open the Backup Monitor by double clicking on the icon in your system tray.

7 Choose Configure Your legacy backup is found under Network Drive. If, below Setup Automatic Backup... you find backups, then delete them. Of course, if, on your own, you determined that you wanted to use this system instead of the Legacy Backup I recommend, then this doesn't apply. This applies if these backups were created by mistake. These procedures should enable you to clean up your backups so you aren't paying for more than you need.