4 ms·

Stolen Laptop Contains Man's Dreams

17 points by RBerenguel 16y ago

cperciva 16y ago
Stories like this make me wonder if I should add a free "graduate student writing a thesis" flag to Tarsnap accounts.
- scrrr 16y ago
  And I wonder if I should write an ebook on "How to write your thesis with a computer". PM me if you want to collaborate. :)
  - cstuder 16y ago
    It might suffice to only have one page with the big word 'BACKUP!' on it. Later editions might expand to 'BACKUPS!'.
  - dasrecht 16y ago
    I'm in ;-) I really wonder how often Students loose their work. Hence nowdays it's so easy to have a good backup running...
- cturner 16y ago
  When I studied they had some small coursework you had to do in the first few weeks to indicate you understood what plagiarism was so there were no excuses if you got busted. Perhaps something similar for backups would be good. I lost data on the weekend whilst trying to resolve differences between directories on machines. I was using meld (at 2 o'clock in the morning) and clicked 'delete' on a selection when I meant to click 'right'.* Spent several hours after that scanning sda1 for byte segments resembling the beginning of xlsx files (no luck). Serves me right for using dumb binary formats that don't lend themselves to diff-based source control. * Brilliant the way the app places those buttons right next to one another.
- joezydeco 16y ago
  There definitely seems to be a disconnect between schools forcing laptops and tablets on students without any education in backing up their media. I'd think there's an opportunity to collaborate with universities and offer a system that's available (and maybe even mandatory) to every student.
michael_dorfman 16y ago
I remember writing my thesis, back in the days before the web. I left (5.25" floppy disk, WordPerfect 4.2) copies with friends in as many diverse locations as I could manage. I copied it onto any hard drive whose owner would let me, and a few who wouldn't (like the college card catalog system--sorry!). I did everything in my power to make sure that my work-in-progress could survive a nuclear attack. Why didn't this guy, exactly?
- RBerenguel 16y ago
  I even did this with some large assignments while on High School. He was just plainly oblivious to data management. Currently I have something like 4 copies of my WIP thesis... All up to date +- 3 days (my USB keychain drive, my netbook hard drive, my office computer who has automatic backup already by the sysadmin and my MacBook, all my running backups being managed through this script: http://www.mostlymaths.net/2009/09/my-backup-script-in-maclinux.html http://www.mostlymaths.net/2009/09/my-backup-script-in-macli...). I know I could add a few more, but it is working as it is, and if all get wiped, probably the problem would be so big I wouldn't mind losing everything.
  - adamsmith 16y ago
    It sounds like you have it covered, but why not use a service like Dropbox or Tarsnap that backs out to Amazon S3 where they have like nine 9's of redundancy? Backing up to the cloud is the next big step in backup.
    - RBerenguel 16y ago
      Indeed. I have started using Dropbox very recently, I am still not used to it. When I'm back home I'll just copy all there, it is just a simple drag and drop! Thanks for reminding me!
    - acqq 16y ago
      I checked the Dropbox, but I don't see why a service of "storing something on some servers" has to be bound to "you must install this app which you have no control of to use the service." The only answer I see is "they want to do something nefarious." Otherwise there would be a simple web interface for people for which that is enough. Or even a simple html based API. Is Tarsnap better?
picouli 16y ago
http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm
gaius 16y ago
This can't even be true - surely the last version he sent to his supervisor to review, so they'll have a copy.
- jacquesm 16y ago
  The story says it contains his research and notes as well.
holman 16y ago
I'm continually amazed at the number of people who don't back up their most important data. I'm not shaming this particular guy- the majority of my non-techie friends make no real backups. Of those that do, very few of them make regular, incremental backups (like Time Machine, for example). With more and more data getting hosted on the cloud, maybe this concern becomes (thankfully) less relevant.
- jacquesm 16y ago
  > With more and more data getting hosted on the cloud, maybe this concern becomes (thankfully) less relevant. Typically as the frequency of the incidents goes down due to centralization the seriousness of the incidents that do happen goes up.
- tomjen3 16y ago
  The majority of technical people I know don't back up stuff either, even stuff that is important. Why that is, I have not idea.
- Tichy 16y ago
  It's still really complicated to do backups. Except perhaps with time machine (the external box that is connected via WiFi). I recommended the Time Capsule to a friend with a Mac, but she considered it too expensive at the time. Why there are no competing products for other OS is beyond me. I also still have backups for my home networks on my TODO list... Most work is duplicated on Servers (email, git), but music and photos are still endangered.
- aw3c2 16y ago
  Cloud storage is not a backup. "Oops, I deleted that file" deletes it in the cloud too.
  - pohl 16y ago
    Being in the cloud is orthogonal to that issue, isn't it? After all, you could use a DVCS in the cloud. Or a cloud service could offer this: https://www.dropbox.com/help/11 https://www.dropbox.com/help/11
oyving 16y ago
In my user support days at the university I studied at, I remember receiving many students on the brink of crying and with a corrupt 3.5" disk in hand. They had their only copy of their thesis on this floppy and were desperate for help. Most of the time the only thing we could do was to dd what was available and pipe it through strings, and sometimes not even that. We tried telling them they should store things on the university servers (which had backups), but it took some time before students learned this.
grigy 16y ago
In my thesis writing days I used to copy each revised version on a CD.
koevet 16y ago
dropbox anyone?
- arethuza 16y ago
  My wife just finished a thesis - that was in Carbonite, a hosted SVN repo and dropbox.
sachinag 16y ago
Every personally important file I have lives in Dropbox (I'd be fucked if this went bad; most recently, Missouri tried to get $30K in bogus taxes from me that I was able to fend off with a copy of my 2004 tax return). My music is synced with SugarSnyc (irritating but not critical to replace since I only buy physical media). I honestly don't get why everyone doesn't do something similar. And if you're truly paranoid, there's Tarsnap.
Ben65 16y ago
Run add for Carbonite, Time Machine, any backup service here. Something that's that important, you don't take a backup of some kind every now and then?
dannoffs 16y ago
Mail the document your own email... Don't need a techie friend or some whacky sync service.
- dagw 16y ago
  Best low-tech solution I've found. No hand-holding and scary software needed. Send an email once or twice a day and you have instant offsite versioned backup. For added security CC it to a couple of different accounts (for example both gmail and university account).
c4urself 16y ago
this kind of story is always a wake up call to hurry up and save/backup your data... the least you can do is send yourself a copy of the *.docx at for example gmail.
aufreak3 16y ago
Backup, backup, backup. I keep critical stuff on 3 different physical media and in different locations. Hard disk + DVDs + online. I feel so sorry for this guy but would never put myself in that position. Now I need to plan for the foretold solar maximum disruption as well! ... whether its true or not isn't the point.
cmars232 16y ago
The sad thing is, it probably would have fit nicely in a free DropBox account, or up on Google Docs.

17 points by RBerenguel 16y ago

cperciva 16y ago

Stories like this make me wonder if I should add a free "graduate student writing a thesis" flag to Tarsnap accounts.

scrrr 16y ago
And I wonder if I should write an ebook on "How to write your thesis with a computer". PM me if you want to collaborate. :)
- cstuder 16y ago
  It might suffice to only have one page with the big word 'BACKUP!' on it. Later editions might expand to 'BACKUPS!'.
- dasrecht 16y ago
  I'm in ;-) I really wonder how often Students loose their work. Hence nowdays it's so easy to have a good backup running...
cturner 16y ago
When I studied they had some small coursework you had to do in the first few weeks to indicate you understood what plagiarism was so there were no excuses if you got busted. Perhaps something similar for backups would be good. I lost data on the weekend whilst trying to resolve differences between directories on machines. I was using meld (at 2 o'clock in the morning) and clicked 'delete' on a selection when I meant to click 'right'.* Spent several hours after that scanning sda1 for byte segments resembling the beginning of xlsx files (no luck). Serves me right for using dumb binary formats that don't lend themselves to diff-based source control. * Brilliant the way the app places those buttons right next to one another.
joezydeco 16y ago
There definitely seems to be a disconnect between schools forcing laptops and tablets on students without any education in backing up their media. I'd think there's an opportunity to collaborate with universities and offer a system that's available (and maybe even mandatory) to every student.

michael_dorfman 16y ago

I remember writing my thesis, back in the days before the web. I left (5.25" floppy disk, WordPerfect 4.2) copies with friends in as many diverse locations as I could manage. I copied it onto any hard drive whose owner would let me, and a few who wouldn't (like the college card catalog system--sorry!). I did everything in my power to make sure that my work-in-progress could survive a nuclear attack. Why didn't this guy, exactly?

RBerenguel 16y ago
I even did this with some large assignments while on High School. He was just plainly oblivious to data management. Currently I have something like 4 copies of my WIP thesis... All up to date +- 3 days (my USB keychain drive, my netbook hard drive, my office computer who has automatic backup already by the sysadmin and my MacBook, all my running backups being managed through this script: http://www.mostlymaths.net/2009/09/my-backup-script-in-maclinux.html http://www.mostlymaths.net/2009/09/my-backup-script-in-macli...). I know I could add a few more, but it is working as it is, and if all get wiped, probably the problem would be so big I wouldn't mind losing everything.
- adamsmith 16y ago
  It sounds like you have it covered, but why not use a service like Dropbox or Tarsnap that backs out to Amazon S3 where they have like nine 9's of redundancy? Backing up to the cloud is the next big step in backup.
  - RBerenguel 16y ago
    Indeed. I have started using Dropbox very recently, I am still not used to it. When I'm back home I'll just copy all there, it is just a simple drag and drop! Thanks for reminding me!
  - acqq 16y ago
    I checked the Dropbox, but I don't see why a service of "storing something on some servers" has to be bound to "you must install this app which you have no control of to use the service." The only answer I see is "they want to do something nefarious." Otherwise there would be a simple web interface for people for which that is enough. Or even a simple html based API. Is Tarsnap better?

picouli 16y ago

http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm http://www.kipling.org.uk/poems_if.htm

gaius 16y ago

This can't even be true - surely the last version he sent to his supervisor to review, so they'll have a copy.

jacquesm 16y ago
The story says it contains his research and notes as well.

holman 16y ago

I'm continually amazed at the number of people who don't back up their most important data. I'm not shaming this particular guy- the majority of my non-techie friends make no real backups. Of those that do, very few of them make regular, incremental backups (like Time Machine, for example). With more and more data getting hosted on the cloud, maybe this concern becomes (thankfully) less relevant.

jacquesm 16y ago
> With more and more data getting hosted on the cloud, maybe this concern becomes (thankfully) less relevant. Typically as the frequency of the incidents goes down due to centralization the seriousness of the incidents that do happen goes up.
tomjen3 16y ago
The majority of technical people I know don't back up stuff either, even stuff that is important. Why that is, I have not idea.
Tichy 16y ago
It's still really complicated to do backups. Except perhaps with time machine (the external box that is connected via WiFi). I recommended the Time Capsule to a friend with a Mac, but she considered it too expensive at the time. Why there are no competing products for other OS is beyond me. I also still have backups for my home networks on my TODO list... Most work is duplicated on Servers (email, git), but music and photos are still endangered.
aw3c2 16y ago
Cloud storage is not a backup. "Oops, I deleted that file" deletes it in the cloud too.
- pohl 16y ago
  Being in the cloud is orthogonal to that issue, isn't it? After all, you could use a DVCS in the cloud. Or a cloud service could offer this: https://www.dropbox.com/help/11 https://www.dropbox.com/help/11

oyving 16y ago

In my user support days at the university I studied at, I remember receiving many students on the brink of crying and with a corrupt 3.5" disk in hand. They had their only copy of their thesis on this floppy and were desperate for help. Most of the time the only thing we could do was to dd what was available and pipe it through strings, and sometimes not even that. We tried telling them they should store things on the university servers (which had backups), but it took some time before students learned this.

grigy 16y ago

In my thesis writing days I used to copy each revised version on a CD.

koevet 16y ago

dropbox anyone?

arethuza 16y ago
My wife just finished a thesis - that was in Carbonite, a hosted SVN repo and dropbox.

sachinag 16y ago

Every personally important file I have lives in Dropbox (I'd be fucked if this went bad; most recently, Missouri tried to get $30K in bogus taxes from me that I was able to fend off with a copy of my 2004 tax return). My music is synced with SugarSnyc (irritating but not critical to replace since I only buy physical media). I honestly don't get why everyone doesn't do something similar. And if you're truly paranoid, there's Tarsnap.

Ben65 16y ago

Run add for Carbonite, Time Machine, any backup service here. Something that's that important, you don't take a backup of some kind every now and then?

dannoffs 16y ago

Mail the document your own email... Don't need a techie friend or some whacky sync service.

dagw 16y ago
Best low-tech solution I've found. No hand-holding and scary software needed. Send an email once or twice a day and you have instant offsite versioned backup. For added security CC it to a couple of different accounts (for example both gmail and university account).

c4urself 16y ago

this kind of story is always a wake up call to hurry up and save/backup your data... the least you can do is send yourself a copy of the *.docx at for example gmail.

aufreak3 16y ago

Backup, backup, backup. I keep critical stuff on 3 different physical media and in different locations. Hard disk + DVDs + online. I feel so sorry for this guy but would never put myself in that position. Now I need to plan for the foretold solar maximum disruption as well! ... whether its true or not isn't the point.

cmars232 16y ago

The sad thing is, it probably would have fit nicely in a free DropBox account, or up on Google Docs.