how do you manage backups when organising files in between backups?

[capall 0]

forgive me if this is a stupid question,

So i have all my photos/music etc moved onto my new server with whs211, which gets backed up to ext drives and the cloud with crashplan/cloudberry. However I need to organize all my pictures into appropriate folders and probably rename many of them, but if I've already started a backup plan, what impact will my re-organizing/renaming files/folders have on my plan?

 

One idea is to the backup plan as is, running server share backups, continue to re-organize said files and folders, then when finished delete the ext. drive backups and perform a new fresh backup??.....But you'll always be adding files to the server, and most likely a backup will run before you finalize the new file / folders

 

Any thoughts on a good process

[ikon 439]

I'm not quite sure of the question. Are you worried about files being orphaned on the backup destinations because they've been moved or renamed on the source?

[capall 0]

all of the above I think, I just don't want to end up with what would be essentially duplicates in my "final" backup.

 

Example.

You take 10 photos, upload them to your server "pictures" share, server performs backup. Then few days later you edit those photos file names, and possibly move them to a new folder. Then another backup runs, and your left with duplicate photos in 2 different folders with different file names on the backup drives. 

 

I suppose, a solution would be to move all files from the "pictures" share into a "temp" folder, keep existing "pictures" share backup on ext drives. Then organize/edit the photos in the temp folder and then when they're "finalized", delete the "pictures" share backup, move the organized photos into the "pictures" share and run a new backup. Then for ongoing new photos, just put them into the "temp" folder first until they've been finalized and then move them into the "pictures" folder

 

Any other suggestions?

[ikon 439]

There are file de-duplicators you could use, even one that can match files based on content rather than name. One I've used and seen others recommend is Auslogics Duplicate File Finder.

 

Another option I use is RoboCopy. It has a /mir option that will delete any files on the destination that don't exist on the source. It's a good way get rid of duplicate files on the destination.

[capall 0]

great, thanks ikon, I'll look into them

[ikon 439]

yw. Please post back with your experience; what you decided to do and how you did it.

[pcdoc 114]

If I understand you question correctly, yes you will end up with duplicates in Crashplan or Cloudberry,  What I did is re-arranged my files and folders, deleted the folders on Crashplan/cloudberry where I had made the changes, then re-ran the backup.  Alternatively, you could let it backup first then go back and delete to old folders that contained the original files.

[ikon 439]

pcdoc, CP has the ability to sync destination folders to the source, doesn't it?

[capall 0]

ikon, will do