Lesson 2: Configuring Data Protection

611

Lesson 2: Configuring Data Protection

You do not want to lose your files. As an administrator, you encourage users you support to

create regular backups. If you lose a significant amount of your own data for any reason what-

soever, your credibility is zero. We all make mistakes. You need to ensure that your mistakes

do not seriously affect the information you store.

You need to advise your users about backup. Accept that all inexperienced users, most senior

managers, most home users, and all family members will have a serious mental block about

backing up data, and any file they lose is entirely your fault. You need to ensure that you and

your users back up important files regularly. You can manually back up your files any time or

set up automatic backups. Whenever possible, implement the automatic option.

NOTE

Automatic backups

You cannot implement automatic backups in Windows Vista Starter and Windows Vista Home Basic

editions.

After this lesson, you will be able to:

■ Use Windows backup and restore settings to schedule automatic backups.

■ Carry out full and updated files only backups manually.

■ Create restore points and use System Restore.

■ Restore damaged or deleted files by using backup and shadow copies.

■ Use Complete PC Backup to create an image.

Estimated lesson time: 45 minutes

Real World

Ian McLean

Once upon a time, a user whom I refuse to name because she’s married to me was work-

ing on a rather large document. She decided to copy the information in its entirety into

another document, so she pressed Ctrl+A. She meant to then press Ctrl+C, but missed

the Ctrl key, so the entire document now contained only the letter c. She didn’t realize

what had happened (a simple Edit/Undo would have retrieved the situation) and

decided she had better call on me for advice. However, she remembered that I was

always advising her to save her work.