Backup features in WhizFolders
On any computer system, a data loss or corruption can occur due to any reason–hardware or software problems, viruses, etc. You must take a backup of all your documents. This is true not only of WhizFolders documents but all types of documents made with other applications. It doesn’t matter what backup tool you use to keep a safe copy of your documents.
A simple copy is enough: Previously, when disk space was expensive and backup mediums like ZIP disks were smaller, we needed special backup tools that “compressed” the backup size and only backed up what was changed. Today you don’t need all that complexity because extra disk space is really cheap and the backup mediums like DVDs can keep huge number of files. So even simple copying of files to another hard disk by using Windows Explorer can save you much trouble when the time comes to restore a corrupted document file.
Like any other document files, WhizFolder document (.wzfolder) files can be copied to a safe place too by using Windows Explorer. Then you can always copy them back in case of a disaster. No special software is needed. In WhizFolders, we have extended this “simple” copy feature so that WhizFolders can do multiple copies of a document for you to a target backup folder. You can set up a backup folder so that when you use the Backup feature in WhizFolders, it will copy your documents to that backup folder. A backup button is provided on the document window, and you can also set up a document to do the backup copy automatically when a document is closed. This way, you can recover your documents from an earlier copy in case of a corruption.
WhizFolders backup is a simple file copy operation: In WhizFolders, a Backup is simply a copy of the document with a different name. To reuse such a copy in case of a document corruption, you just need to copy it back to your documents folder. A backup copy has a date and time appended to its name so you just need to rename it to the original document name before using it. That’s it. There is no need to do some kind of import or restore operation from the backup folder in order to use the copy. In fact, you can go to the backup folder and directly open a document copy to look at it. We keep things simple.
Setting up the backup folder: You can set it up on the Main Window menu “Tools–Backup Options.” WhizFolders will ask you to set it up anyway when you go to do your first backup.
In the above picture of Backup Options, the folder “G:\Mybackups” is set as the back up folder.
There is a second option “Number of document copy names to reuse every day.” I will explain it in a minute. For now I select the value 3 for it.
First you need to understand how the backup takes place. OK. So I select the above backup folder and click on Apply. Now WhizFolders remembers G:\Mybackups as the backup folder.
Backing up a document: Once I set up the Backup folder, all I need to do is, hit the Backup button on the document window, or use the Save and Backup operation on the File menu. As soon as I do that, WhizFolders saves and copies that document to the backup folder. Actually WhizFolders copies it by the same file name but appends the date and a number to that name.
For example, here is a message WhizFolders shows after performing the backup: “File copied successfully to G:\Mybackups\Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 2.wzfolder” Notice how it made up that name. The name starts with “Backup” followed by the document name “My notes” and then the date “20 Dec 07” and finally 2 to show that it is the second backup copy of that document on that date.
Now you will understand the meaning of that second option “Number of document copy names to reuse every day” in the above picture. If I make its value 0 then on each backup a fresh copy will be created. Since I selected 3 for the value, it will create copies by the following names:
- Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 1.wzfolder
- Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 2.wzfolder
- Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 3.wzfolder
If I do another backup operation on that day, the oldest document copy “Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 1.wzfolder” will be overwritten because WhizFolders will reuse that copy name. So I will always have last 3 backed up copies of a document on that day.
If you want automatic backup operation whenever a document is closed, you can set that up on the File Options–Backup page of that document.
There is another option there that also allows you to save an RTF copy of the document at the same time. Use it only for small documents as it will make the backup operation slow.
What if I want to see the contents of the backup folder to explore some old copies? You can do that by going to that folder in Windows Explorer. For example, in this case, I can open G:\Mybackups in Windows Explorer to see its contents. For this purpose, WhizFolders also gives a quick “Open Backup Folder in Explorer” menu on the Tools menu of its main window.
Important Note: Note that I can directly open a backup copy of the document in WhizFolders but it won’t appear in the main window list because WhizFolders treats the backup folder as not a “regular use” folder.
Don’t do this: For the reason given above, please do not set up one of your regular document folders as a Backup folder. It makes no sense. If you do this then any files opened from that folder will not appear in the main window list.
