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I just love history

~ Local and Family History

I just love history

Monthly Archives: March 2018

World ??? Day

31 Saturday Mar 2018

Posted by Susie Zada in Important news, Warnings

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Backup, Data, Recover, Restore

They say a lovely image of animals will attract people to a blog more than a boring photo or no photo at all.

This blog is about a ‘boring’ subject and has absolutely nothing to do with those adorable meerkats!

Who is responsible for World ??? Days?  Who decides what and when?  Who is responsible for maintaining THE list?  And who backs-up the list?

Have you picked up the hint?

Do you know what today / tomorrow is?

World BACKUP Day!

And if you wanted a boring image then this has to be it!

The image may be boring but the subject is SO important.  Remember how many hours you’ve spent researching and collecting your local or family history?  Can you imagine if that was all lost in a flash?

We all know of someone or heard of someone who has lost everything – hard drive failure, bushfires, floods, human errors?

They say the date is important because it’s the day before April Fool’s Day and of course no-one wants to be an April Fool.  Although it is a little difficult from the various articles to tell if World Backup Day is 31st March or 1st April.

It really doesn’t matter because in reality EVERY day is important but today is a good reminder of what you should be doing – backing up your data!

Dick Eastman reminds us at the beginning of every month to BACK UP YOUR DATA.

I was once manager of the I.T. Department of a large public hospital.  Our procedures were locked in stone – backup two copies to tape, then cycle what was called Grandfather – Father – Son backups.  We never missed and the operator signed the daily ops sheet to confirm it was done.  When the backup was completed, one set was put aside to be transported off-site so if anything happened to the computer room, mainframe, hard drives or local backups, there was always a safe copy kept off-site.

What could go wrong with such watertight procedures?

WE DIDN’T REGULARLY REVERSE THE PROCEDURE – we didn’t check restoring from the backup tapes!  We found out the hard way – when we tried to restore from backup – we found that our tape unit had a parity error which meant that for months ALL tapes were useless.

To recover the hospital’s vital database an expert had to be flown out from Blue Bell, Pennsylvania to Australia to ‘recreate’ that part of the database that was corrupted with the parity error – literally bit by bit.

Remember to regularly test that you can restore and read the files that you’ve backed up.

Today I got a new external 4 TB (terabyte) hard drive to backup my Desktop Computer, my Notebook Computer, my iPad, and my smart phone.  There are 1,024 gigabytes in a terabyte, and 1,024 megabytes in a gigabyte.  4 TB = 4,194,304 MB – that’s a LOT of room for backups.

It’s a PORTABLE Drive – it fits in a small padded zippered pouch that can travel with me or be stored elsewhere.  It’s my newest backup but I have 2 TB drives that I’ve tested restoring.

No system will be totally perfect but it’s better than nothing.

Have you backed up your precious files?  If not, DO IT NOW!

Finding records on PROV website

27 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by Susie Zada in Database and Indexes, Essentials, Local History, Uncategorized

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PROV, Public Record Office Victoria, Search records

PROV Simple Search 01aPeople don’t welcome change but sometimes the NEW version is better than the OLD version.  That’s the case with the updated PROV website!

There is still more to be added but it’s definitely worth using the new version.

Learn some simple steps and start to really enjoy using it!

Yarrawonga Family History Group

18 Sunday Mar 2018

Posted by Susie Zada in Local History

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Yarrawonga Family History Group

The Yarrawonga Family History Group have a new web and blog site.

Come and share it.

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Recent Posts

  • More VIC Wills and Probates online! September 18, 2020
  • Beyond 2022 – Irish research July 5, 2020
  • Catch up with Else Churchill and Alec Tritton at Beyond BMDs March 4, 2020
  • Guess what we’ll all be doing in March 2020? February 28, 2020
  • Why is February 14 so important? February 11, 2020

Upcoming Events

  • GFHG Meeting March 31, 2021 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Belmont Library, 163 High St, Geelong VIC 3216, Australia Speaker: Topic:
  • GDHA Meeting May 8, 2021 at 10:00 am – 1:00 pm Winchelsea & District Historical Society Geelong and District Historical Association quarterly meeting
  • VAFHO Expo - Yarrawonga May 15, 2021 at 10:00 am – 4:00 pm Yarrawonga Shire Hall, 100 Belmore St, Yarrawonga VIC 3730, Australia
  • GMA Talk June 27, 2021 at 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm National Wool Museum, 26 Moorabool St, Geelong VIC 3220, Australia Geelong Hospital and Benevolent Asylum: an absolute treasure trove of records for Family History research . Speaker: Susie Zada
  • GDHA Meeting August 21, 2021 at 10:00 am – 1:00 pm Geelong Family History Group, Belmont Library, High Street, Belmont Geelong and District Historical Association quarterly meeting
  • GDHA Meeting November 20, 2021 at 10:00 am – 1:00 pm Apollo Bay & District Historical Society Geelong and District Historical Association quarterly meeting
  • GFHG Meeting January 19, 2022 at 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm Belmont Library, 163 High St, Geelong VIC 3216, Australia Speaker: Topic:

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Recent Posts

  • More VIC Wills and Probates online!
  • Beyond 2022 – Irish research
  • Catch up with Else Churchill and Alec Tritton at Beyond BMDs
  • Guess what we’ll all be doing in March 2020?
  • Why is February 14 so important?

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