Second Copy 8

[Dave McElderry]

I just got a notice that the new version of Second Copy has been released. One of the new features is the ability to copy open files. If they could do that it seems like it would have been an obvious thing to do a long time ago. Glad I won't have to pay for the upgrade. I bought my copy after May 1, which qualifies for a freebie.

[Bobby]

Good for you Dave! I am a bit leery about that open file copy myself - chance for too many things to go wrong.

For example: you have a valid backup from "last night" when the file was closed. Your new copy of SC8 attempts to copy the file today when open and "something" goes wrong undetected and the backup copy is now bad. But it wrote over the original good copy from last night, leaving you with no backup.

Now, you can alleviate this by setting SC to keep multiple archived copies of the files, but I am just trying to illustrate that it is not without pitfalls.

[Dave McElderry]

Good point Bobby. I notice that specifically it says this:

Copy open files using Volume Shadow Copy

Any idea what that's referring to? Maybe that's the built-in safety?

[Bobby]

Hmmm - you got me...

[Chris B]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_Copy

Sounds like the kind of backup that Windows 7 (and vista AFAIK) use in their built in backup (which is actually quite good....)

[Dave McElderry]

From the description it sounds like it could use large amounts of storage space, like a ghost image created with Acronis. I use Second Copy to make specific copies of folders and the files they contain, and I have created several profiles in order to back up different folder sets to different destinations, such as separate hard drives or remote, Internet-based storage. Since it works on an entire volume basis, if I'm understanding the concept correctly, I don't think it would be very useful for my application.

[Chris B]

Quick question - if you're only using second copy to make a backup of specific files how is it better than the built in Windows backup? I think the "restore previous version" feature that windows backup integrates into windows explorer is quite neat (although I've had no need to use it yet).

[Dave McElderry]

I use space on my domain as offsite backup. Once I set up a profile all I have to do is run it and SC treats it like any other storage device. As far as I know the Windows backup doesn't have the ability to do this.

[Chris B]

Good stuff. No - don't think you can map a network drive to a url....

[Dave McElderry]

Aw, you know what I meant.