I know I have written many times about the need to make backups. However, after reading a comment posted to this newsletter's web site this week, I have to write one more time.
In the comments section after an article about a free software upgrade available for a popular genealogy program, a newsletter reader wrote:
This free upgrade was a major disaster!!! It truncated/lost much of my research and I could not retrieve it. Don't use it... (I know I should have backed up my data first, but I didn't.)
It makes no difference which genealogy program you use; there is always a chance of data corruption. Even the best-written, most error-free product on the market may corrupt your data during an upgrade if it encounters an unexpected disk full condition, a power failure, or other problem.
My advice: never, ever perform an upgrade without having a recent full backup.
I practice what I preach: my primary computer automatically makes an incremental backup of its hard drive every hour. A couple of older computers that I still use make daily backups automatically in the wee hours of the morning. I also test the backups occasionally.
When was your data last backed up?
