6 ms·

I do wish they'd spend more time on their client. I choose them specifically because of how they publish results like these, but when your install can get corr

I do wish they'd spend more time on their client. I choose them specifically because of how they publish results like these, but when your install can get corrupted like this [1], it doesn't inspire confidence. 1. http://imgur.com/a/3XmEL http://imgur.com/a/3XmEL

rickyc091 10y ago
Yeah, their software was really buggy so I ended up changing to crashplan. I've been using them for years without any regrets.
- dagw 10y ago
  Heh. I switched my wife from crashplan to backblaze about 18 month ago because I was tired of the crashplan client being buggy. Backblaze has just worked.
  - hrrsn 10y ago
    I don't like CrashPlan very much, but my backups are way faster to them than they ever were to Backblaze. My home connection has 200mbit upload, so I don't think the bottleneck is on my side.
    - kalleboo 10y ago
      Funny, Backblaze backs up faster than my Apple Time Capsule. I'm on a 1 GBps home connection. I guess it all depends on your peering.
      - dagw 10y ago
        100 Mbps here, and backblaze uploads are a good 50-100% faster than crashplan
        brianwski 10y ago
        Brian from Backblaze here. If you want to use more bandwidth in Backblaze, after you install find the Backblaze Control Panel, open the "Settings..." dialog, go to the "Performance" tab and UNSELECT "Automatic Throttle". Slide the manual slider all the way to the far far right. Then dial up the number of threads to 4 or 6. Seriously, you don't need to go any higher on the threads, after we use 100% of your bandwidth you can't get it to backup any faster. :-)
      - hrrsn 10y ago
        I suspect that latency has something to do with it. Crashplan's servers are a good 100ms closer to me.
- thescriptkiddie 10y ago
  I had to stop using crashplan because there is no way to roll back revisions within a file. If a file gets corrupted it'll just back up the corrupted version on top of what was previously a good backup.
  - barrkel 10y ago
    ? That's not what I see in crashplan. Expand the tree view until you get to the file level, and then expand the files: it shows the times of the backup revisions. You can also specify a target time to restore to at the bottom of the restore tab.
  - jarrodatCode42 10y ago
    Wanted to pop in here and expound on the topic. CrashPlan has versioning that is set (by default) to back up changed files in 15 minute increments. If a file is corrupted, CrashPlan will attempt to back up the changes as it is not a corruption detection utility. However, it's versioning allows for a user to easily restore the uncorrupted file by selecting a date prior to the corruption occurring. This process is explained in greater detail here: https://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/4/Troubleshooting/Recovering_Files_Infected_By_CryptoLocker_Or_CryptoWall https://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/4/Troubleshooting/Recov... The default versioning can be adjusted, so ultimately it's the responsibility of the individual user to confirm the health of their backup and verify the versioning frequency that best fits their needs.
- swinglock 10y ago
  The CrashPlan client is horrific but at least it runs on Linux unlike Backblaze. I was hoping Backblaze was better, too bad.
  - haasn 10y ago
    Wait, wouldn't that be standard? I've never used online backup, but I would naively assume that Linux would just have a block device or FUSE driver for these things. How can that not be the case?
    - anonbiocoward 10y ago
      I'm not sure, what would a block device have to do with diff'd filesystem backups? And what would FUSE add? I'm pretty sure the CrashPlan client a .jar, so you just need a jvm, thus broad OS compatibility.
      - haasn 10y ago
        On second thought, block devices are sort of sketchy for this use case - but FUSE still seems like a perfectly natural way to export networked storage. I'd expect a backup hierarchy to just be a directory of read-only snapshots of my files - I mean, this is how I organize backups locally either way (e.g. /snapshot/YYYY-MM-DD/etc/whatever.conf). The advantage of using a standard API like filesystems and FUSE is that you can use it easily and from the terminal without needing to deal with bloated GUIs and JVMs that are no doubt hard to install, hard to use and hard to rely on. A JVM is also a pretty hefty requirement to have on a machine. (I personally avoid installing it all costs, mostly because everything that targets JVM seems to be crud to begin with)
  - click170 10y ago
    This really kills me about Backblaze. I'd love to support them, I'd prefer no other backup vendor. That's why this is so hurtful: https://help.backblaze.com/hc/en-us/articles/217664628-Is-Backblaze-going-to-offer-Linux-support- https://help.backblaze.com/hc/en-us/articles/217664628-Is-Ba... Spoiler alert, the answer is a surprisingly firm no. Not even an optimistic "we're working on it!". Doesn't even have to be "Linux support", just open an API, we'll do the rest! Use quotas for API users if the concern is around abuse, but please help us Linux folks use your service! Please!
pcurve 10y ago
What are we exactly looking at here? That is somewhat frightening how busted it looks.
- slededit 10y ago
  The results of my attempt to try them out about a month ago. These are screenshots I sent to their tech support.
- atYevP 10y ago
  Yev from Backblaze here - Looking at those screens that's what happens when the installer doesn't install correctly (obviously), it can happen for a bunch of reasons, usually the easy stuff like anti-virus and all that jazz, but usually clears up if you reboot and retry.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- toast0 10y ago
  That doesn't look that busted to me, it appears that something prevented localized strings from loading, so we're just seeing the translation tags. It's not surprising that they don't fit in the UI, cause they're kind of long -- probably much larger than the localized strings are.
  - brianwski 10y ago
    Brian from Backblaze here, you are absolutely correct. I'll copy and paste my answer from above to here: The failure in that picture is that somebody deleted the file found at C:\Program Files (x86)\Backblaze\bzbui_interface.xml That extremely simple file contains all the strings for the Backblaze GUI in all 11 languages. What your screenshot shows is what happens when that file is missing. If you run a Backblaze installer over the top of that installation it should repair that by placing the latest version in place as it always does. If you STILL cannot get that file installed, something is going entirely, totally hog-wild wrong with your system. Hundreds of people install every day and that file is always present. If you were running along and suddenly that file disappeared from your computer, I would stop and prepare a full restore from 15 days ago from Backblaze. This is totally free. When files randomly disappear from the hard drive, one cause might be your hard drive is starting to die.
TeMPOraL 10y ago
Well, one has to grant them that they at least did use meaningful labels for their strings. You can figure out how to use the app from that alone.
brianwski 10y ago
Brian from Backblaze here. The failure in that picture is that somebody deleted the file found at C:\Program Files (x86)\Backblaze\bzbui_interface.xml That extremely simple file contains all the strings for the Backblaze GUI in all 11 languages. What your screenshot shows is what happens when that file is missing. If you run a Backblaze installer over the top of that installation it should repair that by placing the latest version in place as it always does. If you STILL cannot get that file installed, something is going entirely, totally hog-wild wrong with your system. Hundreds of people install every day and that file is always present. If you were running along and suddenly that file disappeared from your computer, I would stop and prepare a full restore from 15 days ago from Backblaze. This is totally free. When files randomly disappear from the hard drive, one cause might be your hard drive is starting to die.
- slededit 10y ago
  Since your willing to look at this now, here is the install log: http://pastebin.com/MB6dEiZD http://pastebin.com/MB6dEiZD Looking at it, its clear it had some problems. The issue is the installer said it finished successfully.

rickyc091 10y ago

Yeah, their software was really buggy so I ended up changing to crashplan. I've been using them for years without any regrets.

dagw 10y ago
Heh. I switched my wife from crashplan to backblaze about 18 month ago because I was tired of the crashplan client being buggy. Backblaze has just worked.
- hrrsn 10y ago
  I don't like CrashPlan very much, but my backups are way faster to them than they ever were to Backblaze. My home connection has 200mbit upload, so I don't think the bottleneck is on my side.
  - kalleboo 10y ago
    Funny, Backblaze backs up faster than my Apple Time Capsule. I'm on a 1 GBps home connection. I guess it all depends on your peering.
    - dagw 10y ago
      100 Mbps here, and backblaze uploads are a good 50-100% faster than crashplan
      - brianwski 10y ago
        Brian from Backblaze here. If you want to use more bandwidth in Backblaze, after you install find the Backblaze Control Panel, open the "Settings..." dialog, go to the "Performance" tab and UNSELECT "Automatic Throttle". Slide the manual slider all the way to the far far right. Then dial up the number of threads to 4 or 6. Seriously, you don't need to go any higher on the threads, after we use 100% of your bandwidth you can't get it to backup any faster. :-)
    - hrrsn 10y ago
      I suspect that latency has something to do with it. Crashplan's servers are a good 100ms closer to me.
thescriptkiddie 10y ago
I had to stop using crashplan because there is no way to roll back revisions within a file. If a file gets corrupted it'll just back up the corrupted version on top of what was previously a good backup.
- barrkel 10y ago
  ? That's not what I see in crashplan. Expand the tree view until you get to the file level, and then expand the files: it shows the times of the backup revisions. You can also specify a target time to restore to at the bottom of the restore tab.
- jarrodatCode42 10y ago
  Wanted to pop in here and expound on the topic. CrashPlan has versioning that is set (by default) to back up changed files in 15 minute increments. If a file is corrupted, CrashPlan will attempt to back up the changes as it is not a corruption detection utility. However, it's versioning allows for a user to easily restore the uncorrupted file by selecting a date prior to the corruption occurring. This process is explained in greater detail here: https://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/4/Troubleshooting/Recovering_Files_Infected_By_CryptoLocker_Or_CryptoWall https://support.code42.com/CrashPlan/4/Troubleshooting/Recov... The default versioning can be adjusted, so ultimately it's the responsibility of the individual user to confirm the health of their backup and verify the versioning frequency that best fits their needs.
swinglock 10y ago
The CrashPlan client is horrific but at least it runs on Linux unlike Backblaze. I was hoping Backblaze was better, too bad.
- haasn 10y ago
  Wait, wouldn't that be standard? I've never used online backup, but I would naively assume that Linux would just have a block device or FUSE driver for these things. How can that not be the case?
  - anonbiocoward 10y ago
    I'm not sure, what would a block device have to do with diff'd filesystem backups? And what would FUSE add? I'm pretty sure the CrashPlan client a .jar, so you just need a jvm, thus broad OS compatibility.
    - haasn 10y ago
      On second thought, block devices are sort of sketchy for this use case - but FUSE still seems like a perfectly natural way to export networked storage. I'd expect a backup hierarchy to just be a directory of read-only snapshots of my files - I mean, this is how I organize backups locally either way (e.g. /snapshot/YYYY-MM-DD/etc/whatever.conf). The advantage of using a standard API like filesystems and FUSE is that you can use it easily and from the terminal without needing to deal with bloated GUIs and JVMs that are no doubt hard to install, hard to use and hard to rely on. A JVM is also a pretty hefty requirement to have on a machine. (I personally avoid installing it all costs, mostly because everything that targets JVM seems to be crud to begin with)
- click170 10y ago
  This really kills me about Backblaze. I'd love to support them, I'd prefer no other backup vendor. That's why this is so hurtful: https://help.backblaze.com/hc/en-us/articles/217664628-Is-Backblaze-going-to-offer-Linux-support- https://help.backblaze.com/hc/en-us/articles/217664628-Is-Ba... Spoiler alert, the answer is a surprisingly firm no. Not even an optimistic "we're working on it!". Doesn't even have to be "Linux support", just open an API, we'll do the rest! Use quotas for API users if the concern is around abuse, but please help us Linux folks use your service! Please!

pcurve 10y ago

What are we exactly looking at here? That is somewhat frightening how busted it looks.

slededit 10y ago
The results of my attempt to try them out about a month ago. These are screenshots I sent to their tech support.
atYevP 10y ago
Yev from Backblaze here - Looking at those screens that's what happens when the installer doesn't install correctly (obviously), it can happen for a bunch of reasons, usually the easy stuff like anti-virus and all that jazz, but usually clears up if you reboot and retry.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
toast0 10y ago
That doesn't look that busted to me, it appears that something prevented localized strings from loading, so we're just seeing the translation tags. It's not surprising that they don't fit in the UI, cause they're kind of long -- probably much larger than the localized strings are.
- brianwski 10y ago
  Brian from Backblaze here, you are absolutely correct. I'll copy and paste my answer from above to here: The failure in that picture is that somebody deleted the file found at C:\Program Files (x86)\Backblaze\bzbui_interface.xml That extremely simple file contains all the strings for the Backblaze GUI in all 11 languages. What your screenshot shows is what happens when that file is missing. If you run a Backblaze installer over the top of that installation it should repair that by placing the latest version in place as it always does. If you STILL cannot get that file installed, something is going entirely, totally hog-wild wrong with your system. Hundreds of people install every day and that file is always present. If you were running along and suddenly that file disappeared from your computer, I would stop and prepare a full restore from 15 days ago from Backblaze. This is totally free. When files randomly disappear from the hard drive, one cause might be your hard drive is starting to die.

TeMPOraL 10y ago

Well, one has to grant them that they at least did use meaningful labels for their strings. You can figure out how to use the app from that alone.

brianwski 10y ago

Brian from Backblaze here. The failure in that picture is that somebody deleted the file found at C:\Program Files (x86)\Backblaze\bzbui_interface.xml That extremely simple file contains all the strings for the Backblaze GUI in all 11 languages. What your screenshot shows is what happens when that file is missing. If you run a Backblaze installer over the top of that installation it should repair that by placing the latest version in place as it always does. If you STILL cannot get that file installed, something is going entirely, totally hog-wild wrong with your system. Hundreds of people install every day and that file is always present. If you were running along and suddenly that file disappeared from your computer, I would stop and prepare a full restore from 15 days ago from Backblaze. This is totally free. When files randomly disappear from the hard drive, one cause might be your hard drive is starting to die.

slededit 10y ago
Since your willing to look at this now, here is the install log: http://pastebin.com/MB6dEiZD http://pastebin.com/MB6dEiZD Looking at it, its clear it had some problems. The issue is the installer said it finished successfully.