A backup is a copy of valued data, created as a replacement for situations when the original data is lost or corrupted.

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1 Backup guide 1 WHAT IS A BACKUP? A backup is a copy of valued data, created as a replacement for situations when the original data is lost or corrupted. 2 THE NEED FOR BACKUP Any kind of valued data should be backed up. A backup can be useful after a hard disk failure, accidental deletion, virus attack or any kind of data loss. 3 WHEN TO BACKUP? The time to backup is now. It is advised to backup valuable data before it is planned to make any changes (what could cause data loss) on a computer system. 4 HOW OFTEN TO BACKUP? Important files should be saved as often as possible, but it is sufficient to save a file once per backup. Backup software offer capability to completely automate the backup process. This means, the data can be backed up automatically. A computer can do the backup during lunch breaks or meetings: it does not need any control during this procedure, only electricity The frequency of backup procedures and creation of new data should be comparable. It is easier to recover from losing one day's work, than a week's work, or a month's work, or a year's work. 5 WHAT TO BACKUP? While creating a backup strategy, it is advised to make a checklist of everything, what should be included in a backup. The most important data to backup is what would be difficult or impossible to replace such as experimental results, s, contacts, written documents, etc. The How to backup part of this document will show the necessary steps. There are special cases, when it is also important to save the whole working software system, because it is hard and time consuming to set up everything after a system crash because of a wrongly chosen parameter/driver, etc. In these cases the system image (including operating system, all of the installed software and settings) can be saved by a certain backup software (hard disk imaging software). This means if the system becomes corrupted, all installed programs and settings can be restored from a backup to a stage was saved before the disaster. The necessary steps will be discussed in the Windows built-in solution and macos Sierra chapters. 6 WHERE TO BACKUP? The most obvious solution is to backup using another built-in hard drive. The large drives are cheap nowadays, but this choice does not offer solution in case of physical damage of the local computer or virus attack.

2 An external hard drive offers more flexibility (e.g. the data is easily transportable), so this solution can be good for experimental data. It is considerable, that the drawbacks of the internal disks are not solved here. The network-based storages are very good solutions for backups, but their storage is limited and the extension is not so cheap. They are protected against physical damages occurred on the local computer and also offer some backup option. The Helmholtz personal network drives (H:\) are capable to store documents and smaller amount (1-2GB) of processed data. The experimental data should be stored on our new NAS (IBMI-NS). 7 TYPES OF BACKUP 7.1 FULL BACKUP A complete copy of everything is necessary to store in a second exemplar. When a backup procedure is set up, the first backup will be full. Since everything is saved, this process is slow and needs relative lot of storage. 7.2 DIFFERENTIAL BACKUP The backup software looks at which files have changed since a full backup was made. Then creates copies of all the files that are different from the ones in the full backup. Executing a differential backup more than once will copy all the files that have changed since the last full backup, even there are already identical copies of those files in a previous differential backup. 7.3 INCREMENTAL BACKUP The backup software creates copies of files that have changed since previous backups of any type (full, differential or incremental). For example if a full backup was executed on Sunday, an incremental backup made on Monday, would only contain files changed since Sunday. An incremental backup on Tuesday, would only contain files changed since Monday, and so on. 8 HOW TO BACKUP? As a general rule, it is advised to make a full backup, than a scheduled incremental backup offers enough safety. Set up a backup in a time window, when the implementer computer is turned on anyway (e.g. during a lunchbreak or regular meetings).

3 8.1 MICROSOFT WINDOWS The built-in solution (Windows 7) The built-in solution of Microsoft Windows is designed for fulfilling the basic needs of a backup and it can create differential backups. This means that the backup will be scheduled, but in the case of no changes empty zipped files will be copied. The Windows Backup is located in the Control Panel under Backup and Restore (with category view under System and Security Backup and Restore). A backup wizard can be started with pressing the Set up backup text. After a while a dialog box will appear where the place of saving should be specified: There is opportunity to choose between internal-, attached external- and network drive (for this press the Save on network button). If the Save on network option was selected, a new dialog box will appear where the network path should be specified:

4 In this example a personal home drive (H: on Helmholtz computers) is specified, with the appropriate SCIDOM username and password (Helmholtz username and pass). For detailed explanation please see the how-to document about attaching network drives. In the next steps the data should be selected. First choose let me choose option : Then select the folder(s) with the important data.

5 If the Include a system image of drives: option is also selected here, than Windows Backup will save a file about the whole system (installed programs, drivers, are also included). This option needs lot of storage place, please do not select it, if a network drive as saving location was selected. The schedule can be set up in the next step. Select the appropriate timing and click on OK. An overview will be shown in the last step, click on Save settings and exit to finish the procedure and start the backup. After a successful backup a special folder will be placed: it is named after the computer, where the data was saved. There are further folders inside of this backup folder with time stamps (backup times) and compressed files containing the saved data.

6 8.1.2 Cobian Backup 11 (Gravity) The Cobian Backup is a this time free (please check licensing carefully!)- backup program that can be used to save data from its original location to other drives on the same computer or on the network. The software is downloadable from the following link: Installation The installation procedure is similar to a normal installation, there is only a screen where real interaction needed. The running circumstances of the program and a network account should be specified in this dialog box. The program should be installed as a service and in case of network-based backup the domain and username-password should be specified. In the SCIDOM domain (Helmholtz Zentrum München) this is SCIDOM/Helmholtz.username and Helmholtz password (see below) Setup The program offers a clean user interface, where the backup jobs can be set up. Click on the marked + sign to define a new backup:

7 The properties of the new backup job can be defined in the appearing window. A name is necessary, and it is advised to use incremental backup, without separated timestamps (untick Create separated backup using timestamps ): In the same window, but on the Files tab can be defined the data for backup (Source) and the destination, as storage of the backup. A file explorer window (browse on local- and network drives) will appear after clicking on Add in both cases:

8 The schedule of the backup should be set up as a last necessary step. There are several options to choose between daily/weekly/monthly/specified days of week opportunities. An exact time point of backup is also definable. In the end of the setup procedure click on OK. The software does the backup automatically, errors and more info are shown on the Log tab in the main window and the icon on the taskbar. After a successful backup a folder will be placed, which contains all of the files and (sub)folders of the original data.

9 8.2 MACOS SIERRA The macos offers also built-in backup solution (Time Machine, located in System Preferences), it works straightforward and its setup is also easy. After starting Time machine, the backup disk (location) needs to be selected (click on Select Backup Disk ) Select a drive on the following dialog and click on Use for Backup or Use Disk. In this solution, there is opportunity to exclude data from backup. For specify these files, select Options on the main screen of Time Machine and add files/folders with the + symbol, like here:

10 If the selection is finished, click on Save. As a last step thick the box before Back Up Automatically and close the dialog box. After this the data will be saved automatically by the operating system.