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They did an AMA on Reddit a few months ago[0]. I remember this AMA in particular because they thoroughly explained why they designed some features in certain wa

by mr_t 7y ago

They did an AMA on Reddit a few months ago[0]. I remember this AMA in particular because they thoroughly explained why they designed some features in certain ways. Overall they said their target customers are the ones with absolutely no IT knowledge. I guess this part from one of their answers fits your complaint quite well: But here is the thing -> YOU can work around this problem, the naive customers CANNOT. Honestly, they are too computer-illiterate. But even computer illiterate people deserve to have their files backed up, and they are the target market for Backblaze Personal Backup. [1] From this point of view, I guess a "delete" button could be fatal for some of the older folks out there. But I don't use Backblaze, I don't know if my comparison makes sense and we both talk about the same thing. The Reddit quotes refers to their "Backblaze Personal Backup". [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/b6lbew/were_the_backblaze_cloud_team_managing_750/ https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/b6lbew/were_the_backb... [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/b6lbew/were_the_backblaze_cloud_team_managing_750/ejlawg8/ https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/b6lbew/were_the_backb...

hombre_fatal 7y ago
There are all sorts of ways to created a delete-bucket button that avoids tech-illiterate fat fingering. Like simply burying it in options. Requiring end user to make a billion individual requests is almost as bad as making me call a number to delete my bucket. I’m voicing this here because I was surprised at the UX. I was happy with my backblaze experience otherwise. My bill was incredibly cheap for the amount of data and access I was using. I’d consider using it in the future for things we generally default to S3 for.
typon 7y ago
There are good UI solutions to this problem... For example, a dialogue box that asks you to type "Yes I am sure I want to delete all my data, forever". We do things like this for internal tools at work, seems to go pretty well.
- wlesieutre 7y ago
  GitLab makes you do something similar to delete a repo, but not as explicit with the message. I think you just have to type the repository name in a box (to confirm you read the instructions) and click the delete button.
- tomatocracy 7y ago
  Bear in mind the specific case being discussed is for B2 buckets, not Backblaze personal backup. Anyone using the B2 interface directly I would hope could be viewed as technically competent. If they can distinguish between the two on their end, it would make sense to provide it as an option for B2 at least. The best way to deal with 'are you really really sure' is something like send an email with a link you have to visit as confirmation as that breaks you mentally out of the 'keep confirming without thinking' cycle which we are all at least slightly prone to given the number of confirmation dialogues we all see these days.
pauldavis 7y ago
Your casual substitution of "older folks" for "people with no IT knowledge" is ageist ignorance.
- ses1984 7y ago
  Very old folks can start to lose decision making capabilites. It has nothing to do with IT knowledge. It's why mostly old people fall victim to email and phone scams and refuse to believe the truth even after you show them mountains of evidence. Is that ageism?
  - eitland 7y ago
    The ones I know that has lost money or been close to losing money to IT scams has people around my age.
  - pauldavis 7y ago
    "Very old" != "older" (folks)
    - ses1984 7y ago
      Pedantry.
- nexuist 7y ago
  We all know the type of people OP is referring to. Pretending they do not exist does not really make anyone's life easier, especially when the discussion at hand is literally about trying to make their life easier by reducing the possibility of a mistake.
  - pauldavis 7y ago
    The people OP is talking about are ones who are not computer literate. Those people can be of any age. There's just no reason at all to related it to age.
    - 7y ago
IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
Then how do those customers ever delete anything? Click every single file and choose "Delete"?
- brianwski 7y ago
  Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. > How do those customers ever delete anything? Click every single file? The current recommended work around is to write a very short "life cycle rule" in the web GUI that deletes any/all files 1 day after it is uploaded and let it run for 24 hours and come back to an empty bucket. Yes, I know this is lame. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html Just to be clear, there are two separate product lines at Backblaze: 1) Backblaze Personal Backup which is COMPLETELY automatic and you don't need to delete anything, ever, it is all automatic, and 2) Backblaze "B2" which is a toolkit for IT people and programmers. This is only a problem for the "B2" side, and the IT people and programmers (for now) can write a script or write the "life cycle rule". But we will get this fixed, it is on the roadmap.
  - IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
    Thanks! I wasn't clear about the distinction between those products. Given that information, it really isn't a major issue, if maybe a bit clunky.
bluedino 7y ago
The personal backup product and B2 aren't the same thing and weren't developed with the same principles.
justusthane 7y ago
I don't think that comparison does make sense. B2 is much more of a pro offering.
brianwski 7y ago
I'm the Backblaze employee that wrote that quote. :-) > YOU can work around this problem, the naive customers CANNOT. That was specifically in response to a Backblaze Personal Backup feature request. > I guess a "delete" button could be fatal for some of the older folks out there. Just to be clear, Backblaze offers two product lines: 1) Backblaze Personal Backup which is designed to be simple and easy to use, and 2) "Backblaze B2" which is designed as a toolkit for programmers and IT people. So in this particular case, we SHOULD have a "delete all files" button (for IT people), and we know this currently sucks (it's on a roadmap to add the feature). You can select "some group of files" (like one folder) and delete them all at once from the web GUI, but if you have like 1 million files (which is a perfectly reasonable and normal backup) the web GUI will "time out" and fail to delete all the files in one operation. The current recommended work around is to write a very short "life cycle rule" in the web GUI that deletes any/all files 1 day after it is uploaded and let it run for 24 hours and come back to an empty bucket. Yes, I know this is lame. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html To paraphrase my quote about computer naive users, the reason we don't prioritize this particular feature higher is the IT people (like yourself) are capable of doing the crazy work arounds like spinning up an EC2 instance. :-) But we will get to it, I promise! In our defense, we have 5 open programmer job recs, and 5 open IT job recs, and we're having trouble finding enough (qualified) people who want to come help us build these features for customers. If you want to work in a really fun employee owned business in San Mateo, California where you can bring your dog to work, please come and join us! https://www.backblaze.com/company/jobs.html https://www.backblaze.com/company/jobs.html
Kihashi 7y ago
Wasn't that response talking about Backblaze personal backup, not B2? I would assume that B2 would be targeted at more technical users.

by mr_t 7y ago

hombre_fatal 7y ago

There are all sorts of ways to created a delete-bucket button that avoids tech-illiterate fat fingering. Like simply burying it in options. Requiring end user to make a billion individual requests is almost as bad as making me call a number to delete my bucket. I’m voicing this here because I was surprised at the UX. I was happy with my backblaze experience otherwise. My bill was incredibly cheap for the amount of data and access I was using. I’d consider using it in the future for things we generally default to S3 for.

typon 7y ago

There are good UI solutions to this problem... For example, a dialogue box that asks you to type "Yes I am sure I want to delete all my data, forever". We do things like this for internal tools at work, seems to go pretty well.

wlesieutre 7y ago
GitLab makes you do something similar to delete a repo, but not as explicit with the message. I think you just have to type the repository name in a box (to confirm you read the instructions) and click the delete button.
tomatocracy 7y ago
Bear in mind the specific case being discussed is for B2 buckets, not Backblaze personal backup. Anyone using the B2 interface directly I would hope could be viewed as technically competent. If they can distinguish between the two on their end, it would make sense to provide it as an option for B2 at least. The best way to deal with 'are you really really sure' is something like send an email with a link you have to visit as confirmation as that breaks you mentally out of the 'keep confirming without thinking' cycle which we are all at least slightly prone to given the number of confirmation dialogues we all see these days.

pauldavis 7y ago

Your casual substitution of "older folks" for "people with no IT knowledge" is ageist ignorance.

ses1984 7y ago
Very old folks can start to lose decision making capabilites. It has nothing to do with IT knowledge. It's why mostly old people fall victim to email and phone scams and refuse to believe the truth even after you show them mountains of evidence. Is that ageism?
- eitland 7y ago
  The ones I know that has lost money or been close to losing money to IT scams has people around my age.
- pauldavis 7y ago
  "Very old" != "older" (folks)
  - ses1984 7y ago
    Pedantry.
nexuist 7y ago
We all know the type of people OP is referring to. Pretending they do not exist does not really make anyone's life easier, especially when the discussion at hand is literally about trying to make their life easier by reducing the possibility of a mistake.
- pauldavis 7y ago
  The people OP is talking about are ones who are not computer literate. Those people can be of any age. There's just no reason at all to related it to age.
  - 7y ago

IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago

Then how do those customers ever delete anything? Click every single file and choose "Delete"?

brianwski 7y ago
Disclaimer: I work at Backblaze. > How do those customers ever delete anything? Click every single file? The current recommended work around is to write a very short "life cycle rule" in the web GUI that deletes any/all files 1 day after it is uploaded and let it run for 24 hours and come back to an empty bucket. Yes, I know this is lame. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html Just to be clear, there are two separate product lines at Backblaze: 1) Backblaze Personal Backup which is COMPLETELY automatic and you don't need to delete anything, ever, it is all automatic, and 2) Backblaze "B2" which is a toolkit for IT people and programmers. This is only a problem for the "B2" side, and the IT people and programmers (for now) can write a script or write the "life cycle rule". But we will get this fixed, it is on the roadmap.
- IfOnlyYouKnew 7y ago
  Thanks! I wasn't clear about the distinction between those products. Given that information, it really isn't a major issue, if maybe a bit clunky.

bluedino 7y ago

The personal backup product and B2 aren't the same thing and weren't developed with the same principles.

justusthane 7y ago

I don't think that comparison does make sense. B2 is much more of a pro offering.

brianwski 7y ago

I'm the Backblaze employee that wrote that quote. :-) > YOU can work around this problem, the naive customers CANNOT. That was specifically in response to a Backblaze Personal Backup feature request. > I guess a "delete" button could be fatal for some of the older folks out there. Just to be clear, Backblaze offers two product lines: 1) Backblaze Personal Backup which is designed to be simple and easy to use, and 2) "Backblaze B2" which is designed as a toolkit for programmers and IT people. So in this particular case, we SHOULD have a "delete all files" button (for IT people), and we know this currently sucks (it's on a roadmap to add the feature). You can select "some group of files" (like one folder) and delete them all at once from the web GUI, but if you have like 1 million files (which is a perfectly reasonable and normal backup) the web GUI will "time out" and fail to delete all the files in one operation. The current recommended work around is to write a very short "life cycle rule" in the web GUI that deletes any/all files 1 day after it is uploaded and let it run for 24 hours and come back to an empty bucket. Yes, I know this is lame. https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html https://www.backblaze.com/b2/docs/lifecycle_rules.html To paraphrase my quote about computer naive users, the reason we don't prioritize this particular feature higher is the IT people (like yourself) are capable of doing the crazy work arounds like spinning up an EC2 instance. :-) But we will get to it, I promise! In our defense, we have 5 open programmer job recs, and 5 open IT job recs, and we're having trouble finding enough (qualified) people who want to come help us build these features for customers. If you want to work in a really fun employee owned business in San Mateo, California where you can bring your dog to work, please come and join us! https://www.backblaze.com/company/jobs.html https://www.backblaze.com/company/jobs.html

Kihashi 7y ago

Wasn't that response talking about Backblaze personal backup, not B2? I would assume that B2 would be targeted at more technical users.