Best way to create backup on cloud for EPUB books

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

No drive letters on Linux.

Another reason Windows is better then Linux.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Another reason Windows is better then Linux.

We are going to have to disagree. Drive letters are a relic of CP/CMS through CP/M then 86-DOS then (MS or PC)DOS and all their OS cousins. Unix mount points are in many ways a much better idea.

[BetterRed]

Drive letters and device 'designators' such as LPT1, COM2, … are a legacy of DEC's RT11, of which CP/M was a reverse engineered copy.

You can also blame DEC for Ethernet

BR

[chaley]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

You can also blame DEC for Ethernet
BR

Actually, PARC. I saw it there in '74 or '75 during one of our visits from Berkeley. IIRC they used those bright yellow cables the size of copper water pipes, but that might have come later.

[BetterRed]

Your right, IIRC by the guy who founded 3Com.

But it was DEC and later HP that evangalised it's usage commercially where the ethernet vs token ring and TCP/IP vs SNA wars were fought.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by chaley

Actually, PARC. I saw it there in '74 or '75 during one of our visits from Berkeley. IIRC they used those bright yellow cables the size of copper water pipes, but that might have come later.

Sounds like Thicknet cabling. Unfond memories of the beesting/vampire taps and having to remember not to put them closer than the black stripes on the cable. Inventing ethernet might be the reason that Xerox has the 00:00:0x OUIs.

[DNSB]

BTW, my preferred method of backing up my libraries to use calibre's export/import and then storing the files on an external hard drive, cloud storage and NAS. So far I've been lucky and chosen when to change hardware but a couple of acquaintances have suffered catastrophic failure on their computer hardware. The one who was exporting their library as a backup had a lot less issues restoring their library than the one who was backing up their library ebook files only.

The export is tested by being imported on a VM (Windows, Linux or MacOS depending on what I feel like using). One thing I learned early in IT is that a backup that isn't being tested isn't worth having.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

BTW, my preferred method of backing up my libraries to use calibre's export/import and then storing the files on an external hard drive, cloud storage and NAS. So far I've been lucky and chosen when to change hardware but a couple of acquaintances have suffered catastrophic failure on their computer hardware. The one who was exporting their library as a backup had a lot less issues restoring their library than the one who was backing up their library ebook files only.

That's strange. I've copied both my library and configuration folder from backup to a new machine numerous times. There have never been any issues, not a single one. I don't even understand what issues there could be with this method, unless the user is pretty much computer illiterate (but in that case, how did they make the backup at all?)

One thing that comes to mind, I've always used the same username on all my computers and tablets. Possibly using a different name would break something. No idea, as I have no IT background.

[BetterRed]

The only thing I've ever needed to recover from a calibre library backup is an individual book or format file because of a mistake by me. That cannot be done directly from a set of spanned archives created by calibre's export function. Whereas it can be done directly from a copy of the library maintained by any one of several file sync tools.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

That's strange. I've copied both my library and configuration folder from backup to a new machine numerous times. There have never been any issues, not a single one. I don't even understand what issues there could be with this method, unless the user is pretty much computer illiterate (but in that case, how did they make the backup at all?)

One thing that comes to mind, I've always used the same username on all my computers and tablets. Possibly using a different name would break something. No idea, as I have no IT background.

I suspect that this may be due to differences between the file systems on Windows, Linux and MacOS and quite probably due to the case sensitivity differences between the OS. Within Windows, the user name can be an issue.

As for the people I was mentioning, there have been issues with trying to set up the backup for both library and configuration. And yes, I'm talking about people whose eyes glaze over when mentioning using a batch file to do the backup or trying to explain why they were unable to update their 32 bit version of calibre past 5.44 since the heart of calibre is QT and QT no longer supports 32 bit OS.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

Drive letters and device 'designators' such as LPT1, COM2, … are a legacy of DEC's RT11, of which CP/M was a reverse engineered copy.

You can also blame DEC for Ethernet

BR

And MS DOS was bought in from a company that reverse engineered CP/M or CP/M-86.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

The only thing I've ever needed to recover from a calibre library backup is an individual book or format file because of a mistake by me. That cannot be done directly from a set of spanned archives created by calibre's export function. Whereas it can be done directly from a copy of the library maintained by any one of several file sync tools.

Doing both kinds of backups is good.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Doing both kinds of backups is good.

No need to do an export. Just sync the libraries and settings.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

No need to do an export. Just sync the libraries and settings.

An export is best for disaster recovery or platform change, though I did move from Calibre Windows to Linux in Jan 2017 just by copying files.
I mostly sync daily and export occasionally.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

An export is best for disaster recovery or platform change, though I did move from Calibre Windows to Linux in Jan 2017 just by copying files.
I mostly sync daily and export occasionally.

Why would an export be better when moving platforms? I cannot see an export being any better then syncing the library and settings to this new platform.

The other advantage with the syncing is that if you were to say screw-up an eBook and needed to get it back, you could from the backup. An export, you cannot do that. Or you changed something in settings and cannot figure out how to fix it, you can again do better with the sync.