Comments on: Automatic Offsite Backup http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/ Tips & Tricks for Dreamhosters Thu, 09 Oct 2008 16:48:15 -0700 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Daniel Drucker http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1450 Daniel Drucker Tue, 18 Jul 2006 16:43:26 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1450 I sent the following message to support a few minutes ago. Am I crazy? You folks at DreamHost have spent the last couple days doing your utmost to try to fix things. You've been working hard. That means what you haven't been doing, maybe, is reading blogs and getting the general mood of your customers - a mood that *even among those of us entirely unaffected* has gone from "la la la I love DreamHost I spend all my free time recommending DreamHost to all my friends and neighbors" ... to "wow, DreamHost really doesn't have a f-cking CLUE what they're doing and is reckless and dangerous". Guys, every customer is fully aware that it's their responsibility to back up their own stuff. That's in every hosting provider's TOS. Still, given (a) the events of the past few days (b) how ridiculously cheap storage is (e.g., Amazon S3) (c) the fact that you're supposed to be the good guys, not the fly-by-night guys you really, really, really should be doing offsite backups. There's absolutely positively no excuse. None. Zilch. Do it. Now. Maybe you don't know how easy it is to mirror to another location? Hire someone who does (I'd offer myself, but I'm taken right now). I'm NOT saying you should be LIABLE for customer data! Absolutely not! I'm NOT saying you should _promise_ people you will restore from offsite backups! What I AM saying is that in the event you were to irretrievably lose a filer, you'd have the ability to restore from backup. Wouldn't this be a good thing for DreamHost? You *know* you'd lose the majority of customers on that filer if you couldn't do that... whereas if you could, you'd only make them like DreamHost even *more*, perhaps, than if nothing had happened at all... You're supposed to be the good guys. The reputable guys. Now I find out you don't even do BACKUPS? RAID and backups are not in any way related. If someone's been telling you otherwise, fire them. I sent the following message to support a few minutes ago. Am I crazy?

You folks at DreamHost have spent the last couple days doing your utmost to try to fix things. You’ve been working hard. That means what you haven’t been doing, maybe, is reading blogs and getting the general mood of your customers – a mood that *even among those of us entirely unaffected* has gone from “la la la I love DreamHost I spend all my free time recommending DreamHost to all my friends and neighbors” … to “wow, DreamHost really doesn’t have a f-cking CLUE what they’re doing and is reckless and dangerous”.

Guys, every customer is fully aware that it’s their responsibility to back up their own stuff. That’s in every hosting provider’s TOS. Still, given

(a) the events of the past few days
(b) how ridiculously cheap storage is (e.g., Amazon S3)
(c) the fact that you’re supposed to be the good guys, not the fly-by-night guys

you really, really, really should be doing offsite backups. There’s absolutely positively no excuse. None. Zilch. Do it. Now.

Maybe you don’t know how easy it is to mirror to another location? Hire someone who does (I’d offer myself, but I’m taken right now).

I’m NOT saying you should be LIABLE for customer data! Absolutely not!

I’m NOT saying you should _promise_ people you will restore from offsite backups!

What I AM saying is that in the event you were to irretrievably lose a filer, you’d have the ability to restore from backup. Wouldn’t this be a good thing for DreamHost? You *know* you’d lose the majority of customers on that filer if you couldn’t do that… whereas if you could, you’d only make them like DreamHost even *more*, perhaps, than if nothing had happened at all…

You’re supposed to be the good guys. The reputable guys. Now I find out you don’t even do BACKUPS? RAID and backups are not in any way related. If someone’s been telling you otherwise, fire them.

]]> By: Hans-Göran http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1428 Hans-Göran Tue, 18 Jul 2006 09:03:39 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1428 I have been running automated backups of my site for over a year now using the scripts autobackupmysql.sh for the database dumping and rbackup.sh for "rsyncing" the changes back to my home-server (a Buffalo Linkstation running Linux). The beauty of this is that only the changes needs to be transferred each night. Has saved me more than once... I have been running automated backups of my site for over a year now using the scripts autobackupmysql.sh for the database dumping and rbackup.sh for “rsyncing” the changes back to my home-server (a Buffalo Linkstation running Linux). The beauty of this is that only the changes needs to be transferred each night. Has saved me more than once…

]]> By: matttail http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1409 matttail Tue, 18 Jul 2006 02:16:38 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1409 That's right! In my groogy state I had forgotten reading that article, amazing really that you pulled all that data togeather. Oh dear me, but a catagory? just for me? I'm not that special. ;) --matttail That’s right! In my groogy state I had forgotten reading that article, amazing really that you pulled all that data togeather. Oh dear me, but a catagory? just for me? I’m not that special. ;)

–matttail

]]> By: matt http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1402 matt Mon, 17 Jul 2006 23:47:43 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1402 and I doubt that all of dreamhost is blocking just me and I doubt that all of dreamhost is blocking just me

]]> By: matt http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1401 matt Mon, 17 Jul 2006 23:46:40 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1401 is it just me or is dreamhost having an outtage? is it just me or is dreamhost having an outtage?

]]> By: Unofficial DreamHost Blog http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1389 Unofficial DreamHost Blog Mon, 17 Jul 2006 20:44:36 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1389 Matttail - You already had your 15 minutes of fame on this blog back in April when you made it to the top of "<a href="http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/04/18/5-years-discussions/" rel="nofollow">Most Active Discussion Forum Users</a>" list. Continue your great work and we'll soon have to make a category for you ;-)! Matttail – You already had your 15 minutes of fame on this blog back in April when you made it to the top of “Most Active Discussion Forum Users” list. Continue your great work and we’ll soon have to make a category for you ;-) !

]]> By: matttail http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/17/automatic-offsite-backup/comment-page-1/#comment-1383 matttail Mon, 17 Jul 2006 17:12:56 +0000 http://blog.dreamhosters.com/2006/07/16/automatic-offsite-backup/#comment-1383 I subscribe to your RSS feed, so when I woke up this morning I read your post. *gasp* He's talking about me! I was (and still am) very surprised. All the same I hope that you like my little tutorial. Wow, me - almost famous. --Matttail I subscribe to your RSS feed, so when I woke up this morning I read your post. *gasp* He’s talking about me! I was (and still am) very surprised. All the same I hope that you like my little tutorial.

Wow, me – almost famous.

–Matttail

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