The fact is that there many reasons backup discussions belong here, but if you had to limit yourself to just one, this common and timely scenario (adapted from my recent “ Linux Security Fundamentals” book from Wiley/Sybex) would be it: Imagine you’re responsible for the IT systems powering the municipal services for your small town. But what’s it all got to do with IT security? More than you might imagine.

I’m sure this story has left you overcome with relief and warm, sympathetic feelings.

When catastrophe hits, I have a solid, tested recovery protocol in place.įor all intents and purposes, the workstation part of that protocol involves installing my OS and then, with just two or three commands, restoring all my data to its new home. Let me emphasise that: I erased the corrupted drive, installed a clean copy of Ubuntu Linux, and wrote fresh, reliable copies of around 20GB of data to the new installation in less than a single hour.īesides having a fast fibre optics internet connection, what’s my secret sauce? I’m constantly backing up all my important data to multiple storage locations. (Not counting the time it took me to remember that a known hardware conflict required I disable a non-free Nvidia driver.) In fact, from the moment I decided that the original installation was no longer worth fighting for, it would only take an hour or so to get everything back up and running. The day before I’d been struggling with a broken Python package and I knew there was a chance it wouldn’t end well the next time I fired up the machine.ĭid I break into a cold sweat, thinking about what was lost and whether I’d ever recover? Nope. My tax records, banking information, password vault, and the access keys to my cloud infrastructure. This was the Linux workstation that was host to thirty years-worth of data: The original working drafts of all my books. And just like that, all my work plans for the day ground to an immediate halt. Early one recent morning my Linux workstation failed to boot.

Why data backup is important