tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1527613590529958801.post6851826563476608385..comments2024-03-21T19:08:05.737-07:00Comments on Genealogy's Star: Do you have your genealogical head in the cloud?James Tannerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02989059644120454647noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1527613590529958801.post-86107315533517182632011-04-04T09:38:13.426-07:002011-04-04T09:38:13.426-07:00I've subscribed to Carbonite for a number of y...I've subscribed to Carbonite for a number of years now and have found it invaluable. Also, I have public trees on Ancestry and Rootsweb. To make sure that Ancestry doesn't lose my trees I download them as GEDcoms at least once a month and they are then backed up to Carbonite. <br /><br />I still have databases on CD's, DVD's that need to be backed up. These are indexes, directories, etc published commercially and aren't readily saved on my hard drive(s). Any thoughts on how to handle these?Rosemaryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07230436754902585388noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1527613590529958801.post-82916355838954802302011-03-30T03:51:36.913-07:002011-03-30T03:51:36.913-07:00I've probably been a little bit backwards with...I've probably been a little bit backwards with the way I use Ancestry.com. I enter and maintain all of my genealogy information on the site and every few weeks, I download the file to my computer (Family Tree Maker 2011) because I like the reports that the software generates.<br /><br />A few months ago, a family I know lost all of their computers and external hard drives (HDTVs as well as their car!) to thieves. ALL of their family photographs were gone for good. All they had left were those they had shared with family members. That was something of a wake up call to the need for off site storage.<br /><br />A couple weeks ago, the flash drive I use for my day job got corrupted and a bunch of mysterious folders and files appeared. None could be opened or deleted. I had to reformat the drive, then the same thing happened again. Got a new flash drive.<br /><br />This made it imperative to me that I needed to join the cloud to store my genealogy documents and files. Dropbox is finishing up the initial upload of nearly 7,000 files. It's taken two or three days for this process. Well worth it. The cost is a small amount to pay for peace of mind. I continue to carry a flash drive with my genealogy files with me offsite. I still plan to store this in my safety deposit box and switch drives every few weeks.<br /><br />Paranoid? Perhaps. But why take the risk of losing decades worth of information? I don't think I could ever start over.<br /><br />I've also signed up for the new storage from Amazon. This looks like a good spot to store my music files. The file transfer is terribly slow and cumbersome. The automatic file uploader doesn't recognized my mp3 player where most of my music files are presently stored. I have yet to try this from my external hard drive (different computer).<br /><br />I've become a fan of "the cloud" in a very short period of time.Susan Petersenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02788283253544225956noreply@blogger.com