The Cloud And Your Stuff

A few notes up front as it pertains to this article:

“The Cloud” = The Internet.

“Your Stuff” = Anything you use or put on the internet, be it email, files, photos, etc.

At present there is a huge push going on that is urging internet users like you to house all your data on the internet using free services.

I would exercise caution to anyone who chooses to go this route because there is no guarantee the services you use will be there tomorrow.

What’s most important is having a way to locally back up your stuff that you put on the internet.

Fortunately it’s relatively easy once you know how to do it.

Email

If using Hotmail

Use the Windows Live Mail client. All mail is auto-downloaded locally the moment you set it up. Even if you have a ton of mail and a ton of folders, the client will get it all, not to worry. And if for whatever reason your Hotmail account has a problem, you have a local copy. In fact, every time you start the client it performs a sync.

Even if you can’t stand that mail client, use it anyway just to have a backup. Run it once a week and perform a sync (there’s a button in the software right at the top labeled “Sync”; it’s easy to spot).

If using Yahoo Mail

Unfortunately the only way I’m aware of to get a locally downloaded copy of your mail is to pay Yahoo so you can get POP access. Then you can use the mail client of your choice (Outlook Express, Mozilla Thunderbird, Windows Live Mail) to retrieve all your mail locally as a backup.

REMEMBER: Set your mail client to “leave copy on server” else once the mail is downloaded it is removed from the web-based version.

If using Gmail

Gmail can be accessed with both POP and IMAP. You can use the mail clients listed above to get a local copy. Bear in mind IMAP (unless configured otherwise) does not permanently store local copies of mails.

If using mail from your ISP

All ISPs have a way to download your mail via POP using a mail client for backup purposes.

REMEMBER: Set your mail client to “leave copy on server” else once the mail is downloaded it is removed from the web-based version.

Photos

Use a photo manager program instead of direct-uploading your photos using a web browser. Two popular applications that fit the bill are Picasa and Windows Live Photo Gallery. This keeps a copy on the web and on your local computer.

Documents and Spreadsheets

Simply put, for docs and spreadsheets, always keep a local copy. Don’t delete you local copy after uploading. This is easy enough to do. And being that most docs and spreadsheets are small, you can push them to a USB stick afterwards for easy retrieval later should you need to do that.

MySpace blogs / Facebook stuff / Twitter / Any blog-type or social media service with no backup option

Use PDF Creator. You will be able to “print” anything in a web browser to a PDF file. As mentioned before, this software installs itself as a print driver, except it doesn’t send to your printer but rather a PDF file directly. Install it, go to your browser, load up the page you want to save, hit File then Print, select the PDF Creator “printer” and ta-da, instant PDF. Simple and easy.

Why use this and not a “File / Save Web Page” deal? Because it doesn’t work that well and saves any images as individual files per each specific page. This can turn into a mess in short order. Use the PDF Creator instead.

Accounts and Passwords

I’ve mentioned this as a freebie article on PCMech but definitely deserves a mention here – get a account/password manager. I suggest KeePass Password Safe. I use this software myself.

Remember, your accounts and passwords do count as “your stuff”. They may not be tangible files (other than the database you create) but they do matter.

For extra security and peace of mind, put a “master password” on the database and store it to a USB stick for safe keeping. This way you’re covered if you happen to forget a username/password and your computer dies.

You will feel better if you back up your stuff locally

What’s comical is that the internet as a whole says “Use us! Back up all your stuff here! It’s totally free!” Yeah. Totally free and wildly unpredictable at times.

When you act as the backup and store your stuff to hard drive, disc and/or USB stick, that gives you a whole lot more confidence knowing your stuff is right there where it’s supposed to be instead of some far-off distant server you’ll never see.

How do you know what to backup locally?

For whatever you use on the internet, ask yourself, “Would it make me upset if I lost this?” If the answer is yes, back it up. It’s as simple as that.