[Macworld]

Post your comments for The perfect storm of data loss: a cautionary tale here

[flybynight]

I've heard of a lot of people who fall into that trap with iDisk. The problem is that with iDisk set to auto-sync, it's not really a backup unless you can keep them from talking to each other. Once they do, they are identical, which sucks if the identical-ness is corrupt or missing. I didn't know about the Time Machine issues, but I guess that makes sense. I tell my clients to treat iDisk as a separate disk - that is, don't think about it living on your hard drive if it is on iDisk. Have a copy in your user documents folder (or wherever on your local drive that isn't iDisk) AND in iDisk - then you actually have 2 separate copies. And Time Machine will grab the local file successfully. Either way, sorry to hear about your loss!

[khurt]

I have a MobileMe account and after reading articles like this I wonder "Why?!". I have been using DropBox on my Mac and Windows XP for a few weeks. The things you expected to do with iDisk are all doable with DropBox.

[khurt]

This is also the reason why I get upset with people who suggest RAID1 as a backup solution. They argue that if one drive fails they can recover from the second drive. My argument is that if data corroption/deletion on drive one get replicated to drive two.

[tonypatti]

Backing up. Archiving. Saving versions of old files. I can barely get my head around these concepts, and I've been backing up files for almost 20 years.
The idea of a auto-sync backup bothers me a great deal, since the kind of damage Dan describes has happened to me before - replacing a file with a corrupt version. This is why, god forbid, I see no use in Time Machine, as much as I applaud Apple for giving it to those who don't back up manually like myself.
I'm lucky in that I have one huge video project to work on at a time, and manually managing the backup of that project is time-consuming but simple.
There is something fundamentally unsound about automatic synching, in my mind. I lost all of my contacts when the MobileMe fiasco was evolving. Now I've got a pdf file on my desktop that I saved after a restore. What a joke, yet it would have saved me ten thousand emails begging for contact info I used to have.

[folklore]

tonypatti said:

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The idea of a auto-sync backup bothers me a great deal, since the kind of damage Dan describes has happened to me before - replacing a file with a corrupt version. This is why, god forbid, I see no use in Time Machine, as much as I applaud Apple for giving it to those who don't back up manually like myself.

Time Machine backups are a totally different animal than iDisk syncing. The difference is between a "backup" and "synchronization". TM backups are unidirectional - your files get copied to an archive. When there's a conflict, a new version of the file gets saved. iDisk syncing is bidirectional. When there's a conflict, the most recent version of the file wins.

Basically, had Dan found a corrupt version of the file on a TM'ed hard drive, he could have gone through his TM backups until he found the uncorrupted version of the file (assuming he kept backups going that far back).

[cordobatim]

I've had a MobileMe (dotMac) account for years. I've always felt like it was about to become what it should be, yet for me it's always been a disaster waiting to happen. Example: I change the theme on my blog in iWeb, and every comment gets lost. No, they aren't stored anywhere. No there's not a backup.
It seems to me that Apple either needs to decide to really make MobileMe work, or send it the way of eWorld.

[folklore]

I used to keep all of my current working documents on my iDisk. Just before the MobileMe transition, I moved these critical files off the iDisk because I knew there was a potential for problems. I've still not migrated back to the iDisk, and it sounds like I've been unintentionally wise to do so.

But I do like having a copy of my most important files on my iDisk. It's another layer of backup security for me. I have my Time Machine backups plus a copy on the iDisk. I could lose my laptop and have my house burn down on the same day and yet still have the most important files I need to get work done.

Lately, I've been using Chronosync to accomplish this. Basically, I work directly with the files on my hard drive. Once an hour, Chronosync copies my ~/Documents folder to my iDisk. It then syncs in the background. I imagine I could have the same problem and Dan had, but I'd have TM backups of the files from my hard disk that I could go back to if necessary. And, if a file that's in use gets copied to my iDisk, the next hour that it's not in use, it gets copied to the iDisk again anyway.

[maflynn]

I'm generally not a trusting person and to that end, I don't trust any company, apple google or the evil empire (microsoft) to keep my data safe on their servers. I use idisk as a repository to hold documents that I want accessible when I'm not on my mac. I do all of the editting (and backing up) on my local disk and tm machine volumes.

I think this issue is the skeleton in the closet for many people relying on "cloud" computing. Its my data and I'm taking responsibility to ensure I have a backup.



nonetheless its an eye opening article.

[macreader]

Pardon me, but it seems that putting the primary file of an active database on idisk is like imagining that idisk is a database server, which it's not. I'm astounded that this scheme didn't fail in the first week.

[alansky]

This is also the reason why I get upset with people who suggest RAID1 as a backup solution. They argue that if one drive fails they can recover from the second drive. My argument is that if data corroption/deletion on drive one get replicated to drive two. --Khurt

True enough, but isn't this the risk you take with any single backup solution? The only way to guard against over-writing a working file with a corrupted version of the same file is to use Time Machine or some other backup method that makes consecutive redundant backups of all your files.

[darthkt]

And in terms of file corruption: it points to the wonders of hard copy. A pain to file and keep up with, but better than gold when the irreplaceable file goes zero k. All that is hindsight, and my condolences on the lost files.

[gandhi]

what is so shameful about that is that they use data backup as a key selling point for mobile me. What a crock!

[zulusafari]

I officially ditched iDisk (and all of mobileme) 2 days ago. I'm just sick of it. Way to many sync errors. I now have also moved to a low bandwidth part of the world, so it just didn't make sense to continue to pay for a service that didn't work.