Why I no longer use the cloud for backup (there's a twist)
It may seem strange that I don’t use the cloud for backup anymore, but this story has a twist.
Like many people, I was once caught out by not having reliable backup at home; this was back in the 1990’s. Losing all my data was a massive wake up call, so I first adopted tape backup for my home needs and when it became financially viable, I moved to a cloud-based service.
It was excellent, everything on my PC was synced to their cloud storage and if ever there was a problem I could easily restore from their service.
Then things started to change, I started to use OneDrive as my primary storage for personal documents. This ensured that everything I saved was both on my PC and in the cloud. OneDrive is great but I still wanted the reassurance of snapshots, so I then created a simple batch routine to sync selected content to a local 2Tb disk.
So the table had turned. Rather than regarding the cloud as the backup I was treating it as the master and keeping local snapshots as belt & braces, and this is how I continue to manage my personal data.
In designing CloudFiler we realised that whilst we provide a highly secure and backed up service, some companies require the additional risk reduction that comes from retaining their own copies. So with CloudFiler, each filing location can have multiple sync locations that could be; on your own file system, in cloud storage that you control, or perhaps in a file sharing service like DropBox.
Users only file once and CloudFiler automatically syncs copies to where they are required. So whether you think of the copy in the cloud as the master or the back-up, you can have your cake and eat it.
The best thing is that, whereas your staff can move and rename local files & folders causing all manner of problems, the emails in CloudFiler can be relied upon to always be available and from any device, so you can always find what you’re looking for in an instant whilst retaining the comfort that comes from having your own local copies.
