I had a scare the other day. I opened up the folder containing all my documents for Far From the Sea, and it was gone! The other documents were still there but the main manuscript was missing. No I didn't scream or yell or cry. I was too stunned. My jaw was in my lap and I kept reading the titles over and over thinking it had to be there. It wasn't.
Since I received my netbook I have been using ZumoDrive (It's like drop box) so I can access my work from both the desktop and the netbook. When I could breath again I ran downstairs and checked on my netbook. It was there and I could access it just fine. For some reason after doing that it worked fine on my desktop too. I think it got hung up the last time I used it on the laptop and ZumoDrive thought the document was still open and so wouldn't let me access it other places. That's a guess.
The thing is I have several back up copies. I keep a copy on my desktop, one on a thumb drive and every now and again I email it to myself. It had been a couple weeks since I had updated the backups but I still wouldn't have lost too much. Even if it had been gone it wouldn't have been devastating. Still, when I saw it wasn't there I was heartbroken. I stared at the computer in confusion, I could hear my brain telling me "you have backups for this reason" but my heart was weeping blood at the loss of my baby. I thought I was ready to let my MS out in the world and that I would be tough enough to take the criticism and rejection it would receive. After this little demonstration of how much this WIP means to me I may need to toughen myself up a little.
Have you ever lost a manuscript? How do you backup to prevent fatalities?
Oh, jeez - I'd have had a heart attack.
ReplyDeleteI have lost my earliest works due to computer crashes. Considering I wrote them from the time I was 10-13ish, I don't think the world will miss them overmuch. [g]
I use dropbox for now, and in my more lucid moments I do think to back up to flash drive too.
So strange -- but very glad you recovered your work! Phew.
Sorry about your earlier work. Even if you didn't have any plans for them it's fun to go back and see your writing evolution.
ReplyDeleteI'm a big fan of backups having lost too many school projects/papers so remember that flash drive!
I'd have a heart attack, too. Right now it's on a disk beside me on the desk. I just might have to look into dropbox.
ReplyDeleteI've liked having ZumoDrive. Other than the time detailed above, of course. I saw you did a post on backing up too. Good timing.
ReplyDeleteEek! Like you, I wouldn't panic too much - I email the MS back and forth every night that I work on it, but still. I had this happen when I tried using LiquidStoryBinder; I wasn't familiar with how it saved files and thought I'd lost *everything* of Austin's story that I'd entered into the software. I joined the Yahoo LSB group, asked my question and felt like such a dunce when some helpful folks pointed out where my files had gone [g]
ReplyDeleteYou don't have to loose much to teach you to keep backups. I'm glad Austin wasn't gone.
ReplyDelete