Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!ames!ll-xn!mit-eddie!bu-cs!dartvax!eleazar.dartmouth.edu!earleh
From: earleh@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Earle R. Horton)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: I just thrashed my Hard Disk!
Message-ID: <8888@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU>
Date: 14 Jun 88 06:10:14 GMT
References: <3599@okstate.UUCP>
Sender: news@dartvax.Dartmouth.EDU
Reply-To: earleh@eleazar.dartmouth.edu (Earle R. Horton)
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Lines: 50

In article <3599@okstate.UUCP> ericc@a.cs.okstate.edu (Eric Cloninger) writes:
>Ok, now I'm _R_E_A_L_L_Y_ pissed!
...
>2) The system didn't realize it was initializing a hard disk.
...
The system didn't CARE whether it was initializing a hard disk.  Once
you hit that "Initialize" button, it's just another volume to initialize.
This is a very important point: The system has no way of knowing that
a hard disk with hundreds of man-hours of un-backed-up work is any
more important than a new floppy.
...
>Oop! Ack! Pfht!  This is too bizarre.  Regardless of the recent traffic about
>its debated usefulness, is this where MacZap could've been used?
...
Yes.  I lost the "Volume Info Block" on my HD SC 80.  Situation was
much the same as yours.  "Mac Zap Recover HFS" got me ALL my files
back, except for files which were open at the time of the crash.
Fast, too.  I was back up and running in no time.  But if I had had
any sense, I wouldn't have needed it.

I feel the reason many Mac Backup programs don't get used is that
there is no option to back up a single directory/folder.  Let's face
it, a thirty-volume set with mostly system files and applications on
it is just a pain, especially when most programmers (and possibly many
other occupations) need only to back up a Megabyte or two, on a
consistent basis.  My current solution is:

a)  Use Stuffit or Tar or Shoveit or something to back up documents,
    DAILY!

b)  Keep about three copies of backups for all documents.

c)  Rotate the sets.  Oldest set of floppies gets redone tomorrow.

d)  Never, ever mix binaries in with your document backups.  The
    increase in effort that this causes will cause you to decrease the
    frequency with which you back up important stuff.  Binaries should
    be backed up once, and kept in a separate place from work backups.
  
Remember:  If you typed it in, you need three copies of it!

This kind of thing has happened to me about three or four times now.
Sooner or later you begin to get the picture that a hard disk is a
TEMPORARY STORAGE DEVICE, and if you look at it crossways once too
often, poof goes your data.

I get depressed reading about this kind of thing.  Please, back up
your work, and keep me happy!
Earle R. Horton, Thayer School of Engineering, Hanover, NH
  I wouldn't mind dying -- it's that business of having to stay dead that
  scares the sh*t out of me.  -- R. Geis