Archive for March, 2009

Today I will be blogging about a technology that I’ve been using pretty much since it came out. It’s called Dropbox.

What is it?

Okay, it’s an application that runs on your computer that synchronises a specific designated folder (the Dropbox) with the Dropbox servers. So basically, you put whatever files you want into this folder and it’ll upload it online somewhere.

So you maybe saying to yourselves “Big whoop, so what?!”. Well, the brilliant thing about Dropbox is that it allows synchronisation across computers over multiple platforms (Windows, Mac, Linux). What’s even better is that file permissions also remain consistent. The problem I face with backing up files on linux is that if I were to copy it onto an external drive, it’ll be NTFS formatted. So basically when I do a backup restore, all the files will have permission 777, which for those who don’t know…is the ability for anyone to do anything to the file…which is bad…very bad. A simple solution would be to just tar all your documents, it’s nice and simple, keeps file integrity and consistency…BUT…unless you want to extract everything all at once, it could be a problem. Ever tried opening a 3gb tar file containing over 20,000 compressed files? It could take a while.

If you haven’t realised already, dropbox is very useful as a backup service. It does it automatically as well! So if you want to format, you don’t have to bother burning or copying everything to disk. Just format as you would, install dropbox and wait for your files to be downloaded in their original form.

Still not convinced? Okay…who knows anything about version control? Dropbox supports version control. What that means is, if you were editing a Word document and for some reason accidentally deleted an entire paragraph, saved the file and exited word preventing any hope of “undoing”, you can log onto dropbox and restore an older version of the document. Dropbox keeps a copy of your document for EVERY single edit that you’ve made (although I think there is a limit). What this also means is that IF you deleted a file or folder you can also restore it through dropbox. Handy.

Another interesting feature is that it allows you to share certain folders with your friends! Which is extremely nifty.

If you are interested take a look at their website.

If you feel like signing up to dropbox PLEASE use my referral link:

https://www.getdropbox.com/referrals/NTMxODIwMjk

What it does is that you and I both receive an extra 256mb on top of  the 2gb supplied by dropbox. So please use the referral link.