Tag: Backup

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Tutorial

Ubuntu Server + CrashPlan + Backup + Remote Management using Mac

We already use rsanpshot for backups. But its always feel safe to have more than one kind of backup.

For other type of backup, we use Crashplan. They support all major platforms, provides many options and have their service decently priced. It will take a separate post to list down all things I like about Crashplan so lets get back to work here!

What I wanted to do:

  1. Run Crashplan on Ubuntu Headless Server.
  2. Manage it using Crashplan desktop software on my Mac.
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I guess you can start remote X session or something like that on a Ubuntu server but that will be overkill for server. Specially when you can achieve above tasks in just 2 minutes using following commands.

Preparation

Crashplan on Ubuntu will need Java Runtime (JRE). Crashplan can install it itself but I prefer to have more control over which JRE I end up putting on our server. They have almost 5 version of JAVA for Ubuntu!

Anyway, just run following command as root user or with sudo access:

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apt-get install openjdk-7-jre-headless

Install Crashplan

Next, we will install Crashplan directly.

Go to Crashplan site, select Linux version and copy-download link to grab latest Crashplan version. Crashplan 3.2.1 is latest as of July 2012.

Run following commands to download, uncompress and install CrashPlan or CrashPlan+…

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wget http://download.crashplan.com/installs/linux/install/CrashPlan/CrashPlan_3.2.1_Linux.tgz
tar -zxvf CrashPlan_3.2.1_Linux.tgz
cd CrashPlan-install
./install.sh

If you are using CrashPlan PRO, use following…

wget http://download.crashplan.com/installs/linux/install/CrashPlanPRO/CrashPlanPRO_3.5.3_Linux.tgz
tar -zxvf CrashPlanPRO_3.5.3_Linux.tgz
cd CrashPlanPRO-install
./install.sh

Installer will ask you for many questions. Just keep hitting enter keys. Defaults options are all good to go ahead!

At this point Crashplan is running on your Ubuntu Server but it’s not backing anything yet! We will use Crashplan’s Desktop edition for Mac to start backup.

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Troubleshooting

If your installation ends with warning:

Your Linux system is currently configured to watch 8192 files in real time.
We recommend using a larger value; see the CrashPlan support site for details

Then you need to tweak sysctl file:

/etc/sysctl.d/custom.conf
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Add…

fs.inotify.max_user_watches=1048576

Save changes…

sysctl -p

Remote Management UI (using Mac)

Go to Crashplan’s site. This time download Crashplan for Mac & Install it.

If you have started Crashplan after installation, quit it.

Open terminal to edit Crashplan config file…

vim /Applications/CrashPlan.app/Contents/Resources/Java/conf/ui.properties

You can use any text-editor in case you don’e like Vim.

Find a line like below:

#servicePort=4243

Change it to:

servicePort=4200

Note that we have changed port number from 4243 to 4200 (in case you thought we just uncomment it!).

Save file. Exit vim.

Create SSH Tunnel from your mac to remote Ubuntu server using a command-like below:

ssh -L 4200:localhost:4243 username@hostname

Replace username and hostname with your a real username on your hostname. You can put your server IP address also.

After you run above command, you will be logged into a shell on your server. Keep it running as its connecting your desktop crashplan to your server crashplan!

Finally, you can start your Crashplan on Mac and configure backup for your Ubuntu Server!

In case you are already using Crashplan to manage your Mac’s local backup:

  • You will need to exit from shell (to break connection)
  • comment-out “servicePort” line in Crashplan config
  • Restrat Crashplan so it will work with Mac’s local config

There is no easy-way to switch between local & remote machines. (Atleast at the time of writing this…)

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Reviews

Backup your Instagram Photos to Your Computer

Instagram has been a hot topic over the last couple of weeks. First added a lot more fans by becoming available on Android. That part was followed up by Facebook acquiring Instagram.

Not all fans of Instagram are happy about Facebook acquiring the company as they fear that Facebook will kill Instagrams independence and turn it into just a feature.

There are a couple of quick ways to backup your Instagram photos on your computer.

#1. Instaport

Visit Instaport.me and use your Instagram login credentials to authorize the app. Once we are done with the authorization the site shows a page which allows us to download photos in a .zip file.

The advanced options allow users to download all your photos, photos from a specific time frame and even all the photos you liked from other users. It also allows downloading upto 100 Instagram photos from a particular tag.

Link: Instaport

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#2. Instagram to Dropbox

My favourite backup application is Dropbox. It works great with other websites and I use it to backup my Facebook photos automatically on my computer.

I like using this iftttt recipe that automatically backups my Instagram photos to my Dropbox account.

Link: Instagram to Dropbox

I personally like using the second option because it works automatically and behind the scenes but for more features using Instaport is great too.

Do drop in your comments.

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Tips

Backup All Firefox Settings Using FEBE [ Including Firefox Extensions]

You are working in an office and you are told to change your computer. You might have plenty of data on your computer, lets not talk about that but if  you are a Firefox user then I am sure you might have many Firefox Add-ons to your browser. To re-install all the add-ons would you like to maintain a list to keep a count of that. In that case what would you like to do?

You can not only backup the browser but you can use it to sync up multiple Firefox browser, how it can be done?

Lets Firefox do it for you, Firefox has an extension called FEBE, it stands for Firefox Environment Backup Extension. First take a backup it will give you a backup file, now you can restore it on another PC(you must have FEBE on the other PC) this way you can get all those add-ons which were present in your first PC.

Advantage :

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  • It is beneficial in case of Firefox crash.
  • Restore all add-ons at one click at different PC.
  • Take a backup copy to restore for later use.
  • You can store backup file online to restore it anytime anywhere.
  • FEBE not only backs up your extension but themes, bookmarks, preferences, passwords, cookies and just about everything else Firefox offers.
  • You can selectively restore only the items you need. For instance, you may just want your bookmarks restored and leave everything else as it was.

How to go about it :

  • Download and install FEBE add-on.
  • Take a backup of your add-ons at just a single click. Several options are available, you can schedule your backup daily or weekly or monthly basis.
  • The backup file is created, you can store it on your computer’s hard drive.
  • To sync up Firefox with another computer you need to install FEBE and restore backup file over there.

Link: FEBE

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Reviews

Backup your online accounts in a jiffy

Imagine, you have all you important messages on Gmail (or any other free services for that matter)  and suddenly, a meteor strikes Google servers deleting all your data! or some Hacker intrudes your account and swipes it clean! What are you going to do? There no guarantee that you’ll get it back.

To prevent this horrifying situation, you can backup your data using a service called Backupify (powered by Amazon). This service can backup

  • Gmail
  • Twitter
  • Google Docs
  • Flickr
  • Facebook
  • Basecamp
  • WordPress
  • Delicious
  • Photobucket
  • Blogger
  • FriendFeed
  • More coming soon… (Tumblr, Youtube, RSSfeed)
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If you have a self hosted WordPress blog, you can also use the backupify plugin to backup all your blog post.

If you register your account now (before January 31, 2010), you’ll have an account free for life! So, what are you waiting for kiddies? Go get it! Otherwise, you’ll have to pay about $4/month.

Link: ZdNet Blogs

[Editor’s Note: This post is submitted by our guest blogger Suhas Sharma. He is a 16 year old tech geek who writes about technology at Suhastech.

If you, too would like to write for Devils Workshop, please check this. Details about our revenue sharing programs are here.]

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Tips

Keeping your data safe on the clouds

Data loss is a nightmare for any of us. Imagine your hard disk crashing overnight for no reason and you, loosing all your hard earned data in a split second (It actually, has happened with me, once).

Scary? Well, keeping backup is the fool proof idea to keep your data safe. Today, I’m going to tell you about the best-of-the-best data backup and sync tools available on the internet which will enable you not only to back up your data, but also to access it from anywhere in the world.

  1. CrashPlan : It is available for Windows/Linux/Mac OS/Open Solaris. Extremely user friendly interface. You can back your data up offline by downloading their software and the software will automatically sync your data to the servers when you get online. 
  2. Mozy : Available for Windows/Mac, It has a basic FREE pack with 2 GB of online storage for you backups. The major plus point is, it is an automatic backing up system. Once you install Mozy in your computer, and it will take backups all by itself in real time. You can however, set the frequency of the backups taken.
  3. DropBox : This is my favourite backup tool. I use it personally because it gives me seamless integration to both linux and windows backups. It is available for Windows/Linux/Mac and with a basic free plan of 2GB online storage. The best thing about drop box is, whenever you sign in for dropbox, you will get a referall link. If your friends sign up to dropbox using that link of yours, you get additional storage for your DropBox account.
  4. Jungle Disk : Jungle Disk takes a different approach to backup on several different levels. Rather than offering a flat rate pricing for unlimited storage, Jungle Disk operates on a fee system. You pay $2 a month per account plus a fee per GB of data used. The fee structure per GB is currently: $0.15 for storage, $0.10 for upload, and $0.17 for download.
  5. Carbonite : Available for Windows and Mac, they have a simple pricing plan: $54.95 for a year of unlimited storage from a single computer. Like Mozy, Carbonite also offers block-level incremental backup to speed up the backup process. You can access your files through a web-based interface when you are away from home, and you can use the Carbonite application to restore all or some of your files at any time.

[Editor’s Note: This is a post written by our Guest Blogger Rishabh Agarwal. He is an engineer by profession and web designer by choice along with being a Linux enthusiast. He writes on technology at Techylabs.

If you too like to write for Devils Workshop, please check this. Details about our revenue sharing programs are here.]

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Reviews

5 Websites To Backup Tweets

If you are a Twitter user then it is must you take backup of your Tweets. So here is a list of 5 websites that will help you in taking backup of all your Tweets. Not only tweets you can also take backup of your friend list, settings and many more.

1. BackupMyTweets : A free service that lets you backup your tweets in a single click. Just login with your Twitter account and this site will do rest of the work.

2. LifeStreamBackup : An online backup service that will not only backup your Tweets but also support backup of Photobucket, Google docs, Delicious and WordPress.

3. TweetAke : Tweetake is here to allow you to back-up your followers, people you are following and Tweets with just one click.

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4. TweetScan : It takes backup of your last 1000 messages from Twitter and combine with results from their historical database. Tweet Scan can also retain your tweets to improve later backups.

5. TweetBackup : Allows you to take backup of your tweets and save it as HTML or in simple txt file. Visit and enjoy.

Bonus Site

TweetBook : This is one of my favorite service as it allows you to generate a pdf e-book of your latest tweets and favorites. It also helps in sharing the tweetbook with your friends. Do try it once.

[Editor’s Note: This guest post is by Gagan. Gagan blogs on internet & technology at CreativeBloggingIdeas.

If you like to write for Devils Workshop, please check this. Details about our revenue sharing programs are here.]

Also visit Technoholic for latest updates on spy gadgets, laptops, mobiles & digital cameras reviews

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Tips

Now Backup list of your Orkut Friends on your Hard Disk!

Its not too long that, Orkut Plus launched a scrap backup tool called Scrap Backup mate using which it was possible to backup a copy of all the scraps of Orkut scrapbook locally (i.e. on your hard-disk).

Because of a huge positive response to this awesome tool, OrkutPlus has recently developed another similar tool using which, you can backup the list of people in your Orkut Friend’s list along with the link to their Orkut profile and their name and E-mail Address.

This tool named Friends Backupmate, has the ability to store all your friend’s Orkut profile link just with a single mouse click. The advantage of such tool is that, if accidentally, your Orkut profile gets deleted, you can retain the relationship with the friends in your old (deleted) Orkut profile. According, to the official coder of OrkutPlus, they are looking for developing one such tool that will automatically add all the backed up friends in your new profile.

If you too want to backup your friend’s profile, just visit Friends backup page (English | Portuguese), provide your Orkut login and within seconds, a list of all the people in your friends list will be generated. 🙂

Links: More Info | Friends Backup tool ( English | Portuguese )

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Reviews

Backup your Orkut Scraps using Scrap Backupmate

Guess what? You want to view all your scraps right from the day you created your Orkut account, or you just want to review all your scraps. Do you think this is possible? If you have a lots of scraps, say 5000 then to view the first scrap will you keeping turning pages of your scrap book till the last page? Not possible, right? But using Orkutplus’ new tool – Scrap backupmate all such things is really possible. 🙂 All you need to do is visit the tool page, provide your Orkut login and you are done. All the scraps can now be seen on one single HTML page.

To test its effectiveness,  I tried using it myself first, using my own Orkut login. All I can say is, the tool is simply awesome!! My scrapbook contains about 3000 scraps which was being loaded into single html page in less than 4 minutes. Well, instead of just viewing your previous scraps, this tool has some other usefulness too. Say, you can even store all the scraps locally just by pressing Save (Ctrl+S) which you can later view as a web page. Infact, this tool was created to backup your scraps but I’ll rather use it to view my past conversations with people.. 😉 Let us know how you will utilize the efforts of Gaurav in creating this awesome tool?

Links: Official Release (English, Portuguese) | Tool (English, Portuguese)

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Tips

Backup Gmail Emails using Gmail Backup

These days, online mail accounts are like postal addresses. All your official and personal communication takes place via E-mail ids and it would be a nightmare if you find that, your important information and emails were being deleted by hackers. To prevent from such kind of problems, you may make use of Gmail Backup, a tool to backup all your emails present in Gmail account. At present this tool is made available only for Gmail users and comes absolutely free. 🙂

 

  • Just download this tiny application, install it, and save your login into this application.
  • Also you’ll need to activate IMAP option from your Gmail settings page.

Now you can backup all your emails in a regular interval and store them locally.

Links: Gmail Backup

(Via LifeHacker)