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It was nice when everything was saved in your PC .. unless you forgot to back things up. I think services like Dropbox/Mega are the happy medium. All the files

It was nice when everything was saved in your PC .. unless you forgot to back things up. I think services like Dropbox/Mega are the happy medium. All the files are actually on your computer. If they go away, you don't lose your files, they just stop syncing. When you put all your crap "in the cloud" (rolls eyes), it means the services you like may stop working, or they could release a new crappy version with no ability to revert to the previous one.

Piskvorrr 9y ago
Yup. "Nice files you have there. It would be a shame if something were to...happen...to them, right? Oh, and btw, we have another, more expensive, cloud tier, much safer, sure."
nerdponx 9y ago
Sorta off-topic, but I have had nothing but positive experiences with Mega. They have an enormous 50GB free tier, but I've been thinking of upgrading anyway and just using it as a full backup for my media hard drive.
- jtokoph 9y ago
  I've read that Kim Dotcom as no involvement with the site anymore and it's been taken over by a combination of the NZ Gov't and Hollywood. He says he doesn't trust it. Whether he's just fuming or it's a legit concern of trust is up to you to decide.
  - nerdponx 9y ago
    Figures it'd be too good to be true. Got any links for that? It really depends on what "trust" means in this case.
MrMember 9y ago
I use an encrypted container in Dropbox. I retain complete control over my files but they are still backed up, and Dropbox is smart enough to only upload the diff if something in the container changes. It's a little inconvenient in that I can't for example access individual files on my phone without a lot of hassle but overall it's an adequate solution for my needs.
- SugoiDev 9y ago
  A delta of changes in an encrypted container should be very close to the size of the full container, shouldn't? It seems this will only be feasible when we have homorphic encryption ready. If someone is interested on that kind of encryption, see "A FULLY HOMOMORPHIC ENCRYPTION SCHEME"[1] and "Fully Homomorphic Encryption without Bootstrapping "[2] [1] https://crypto.stanford.edu/craig/craig-thesis.pdf https://crypto.stanford.edu/craig/craig-thesis.pdf [2] https://eprint.iacr.org/2011/277.pdf https://eprint.iacr.org/2011/277.pdf
  - maxton 9y ago
    That would depend on the cipher mode, no? Assuming the container is using something like CTR, the diff should only consist of changed bytes.
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - mikeash 9y ago
    Any encrypted disk image will work this way. It doesn’t require anything like homomorphic encryption, just a bit of metadata and key management.
  - RasputinsBro 9y ago
    No. AES encrypts blocks (I think 256kb?). So that's the only thing you have to sync.
    - syrrim 9y ago
      If you use plain AES ECB, then little penguins will show up in your encrypted data. You would want to use a disk encryption scheme, like XTS, where the encryption is not just based on the data of the block, but also on the index of the block, to prevent identical blocks at different locations from looking identical. You also want it to be based on a nonce of some sort, to prevent attackers from reverting a block to an older copy.
mikeash 9y ago
Make sure you have separate backups too. If Dropbox deletes a file from your account, the client will delete the file from your computer!
- mikenew 9y ago
  One of the reasons I switched out of Dropbox was because they got rid of the version history feature, which I only learned about after desperately trying to recover an old file. I think now they give you 120 days of version history, but only if you pay for the newly created “professional” tier. I have a little Nextcloud server set up with unlimited file history now. Or at least it’s only limited by how many old hard drives I have plugged into it. Couldn’t be happier with my decision to switch.
  - bllguo 9y ago
    Supposedly the free accounts still have 30 days: https://www.dropbox.com/help/security/version-history-overview https://www.dropbox.com/help/security/version-history-overvi... Nevertheless, definitely agree about version control being a killer feature. Might need to go down your route at some point.
  - dingo_bat 9y ago
    Onedrive has a "Recycle Bin". Worked well when I needed to restore some accidentally deleted photos. But their paid tier is horribly priced. Ugh.
brightball 9y ago
Agreed. I like Dropbox Paper a lot too. Just a solid all around company.
twiss 9y ago
I made a Google Docs alternative where not only the documents are private, but you also have your own private installation of the app, even though it's hosted in the cloud: https://www.airbornos.com https://www.airbornos.com. If you enable "Notify me before updating Airborn OS" when registering, Airborn OS won't update for you unless you want it to. Theoretically, since you have your own installation, you could even modify the code you're running - but there's no UI for that yet.
xelxebar 9y ago
I keep a virtual server for precisely this reason. All my docs sit in a git repo and sync to the server. It even works for binary stuff with git-annex! I know this kind of thing isn't for everyone, but I love it.

Piskvorrr 9y ago

Yup. "Nice files you have there. It would be a shame if something were to...happen...to them, right? Oh, and btw, we have another, more expensive, cloud tier, much safer, sure."

nerdponx 9y ago

Sorta off-topic, but I have had nothing but positive experiences with Mega. They have an enormous 50GB free tier, but I've been thinking of upgrading anyway and just using it as a full backup for my media hard drive.

jtokoph 9y ago
I've read that Kim Dotcom as no involvement with the site anymore and it's been taken over by a combination of the NZ Gov't and Hollywood. He says he doesn't trust it. Whether he's just fuming or it's a legit concern of trust is up to you to decide.
- nerdponx 9y ago
  Figures it'd be too good to be true. Got any links for that? It really depends on what "trust" means in this case.

MrMember 9y ago

I use an encrypted container in Dropbox. I retain complete control over my files but they are still backed up, and Dropbox is smart enough to only upload the diff if something in the container changes. It's a little inconvenient in that I can't for example access individual files on my phone without a lot of hassle but overall it's an adequate solution for my needs.

SugoiDev 9y ago
A delta of changes in an encrypted container should be very close to the size of the full container, shouldn't? It seems this will only be feasible when we have homorphic encryption ready. If someone is interested on that kind of encryption, see "A FULLY HOMOMORPHIC ENCRYPTION SCHEME"[1] and "Fully Homomorphic Encryption without Bootstrapping "[2] [1] https://crypto.stanford.edu/craig/craig-thesis.pdf https://crypto.stanford.edu/craig/craig-thesis.pdf [2] https://eprint.iacr.org/2011/277.pdf https://eprint.iacr.org/2011/277.pdf
- maxton 9y ago
  That would depend on the cipher mode, no? Assuming the container is using something like CTR, the diff should only consist of changed bytes.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- mikeash 9y ago
  Any encrypted disk image will work this way. It doesn’t require anything like homomorphic encryption, just a bit of metadata and key management.
- RasputinsBro 9y ago
  No. AES encrypts blocks (I think 256kb?). So that's the only thing you have to sync.
  - syrrim 9y ago
    If you use plain AES ECB, then little penguins will show up in your encrypted data. You would want to use a disk encryption scheme, like XTS, where the encryption is not just based on the data of the block, but also on the index of the block, to prevent identical blocks at different locations from looking identical. You also want it to be based on a nonce of some sort, to prevent attackers from reverting a block to an older copy.

mikeash 9y ago

Make sure you have separate backups too. If Dropbox deletes a file from your account, the client will delete the file from your computer!

mikenew 9y ago
One of the reasons I switched out of Dropbox was because they got rid of the version history feature, which I only learned about after desperately trying to recover an old file. I think now they give you 120 days of version history, but only if you pay for the newly created “professional” tier. I have a little Nextcloud server set up with unlimited file history now. Or at least it’s only limited by how many old hard drives I have plugged into it. Couldn’t be happier with my decision to switch.
- bllguo 9y ago
  Supposedly the free accounts still have 30 days: https://www.dropbox.com/help/security/version-history-overview https://www.dropbox.com/help/security/version-history-overvi... Nevertheless, definitely agree about version control being a killer feature. Might need to go down your route at some point.
- dingo_bat 9y ago
  Onedrive has a "Recycle Bin". Worked well when I needed to restore some accidentally deleted photos. But their paid tier is horribly priced. Ugh.

brightball 9y ago

Agreed. I like Dropbox Paper a lot too. Just a solid all around company.

twiss 9y ago

I made a Google Docs alternative where not only the documents are private, but you also have your own private installation of the app, even though it's hosted in the cloud: https://www.airbornos.com https://www.airbornos.com. If you enable "Notify me before updating Airborn OS" when registering, Airborn OS won't update for you unless you want it to. Theoretically, since you have your own installation, you could even modify the code you're running - but there's no UI for that yet.

xelxebar 9y ago

I keep a virtual server for precisely this reason. All my docs sit in a git repo and sync to the server. It even works for binary stuff with git-annex! I know this kind of thing isn't for everyone, but I love it.