I have checked the box “Limit file versions to file and folder backups” and set the limit to four without really understanding what would happen. What exactly is being limited here as it relates to Files? Folders?
Do I have to create a new Task to reduce the number limit or will Ghost accept a modification of this value to an existing Task.
ynotadlog wrote:I have checked the box “Limit file versions to file and folder backups” and set the limit to four without really understanding what would happen. What exactly is being limited here as it relates to Files? Folders?
Do I have to create a new Task to reduce the number limit or will Ghost accept a modification of this value to an existing Task.
HI again Ynotadlog,
When the number of versions your specify has exceeded the threshold Ghost will remove the oldest versions and yes any change to this paramater will be seen by Ghost if you modify the backup job. So if you want a higher number you should change this to reflect how many versions you wish to keep.
Allen
Am I correct in my understanding that here you are referring to versions of individual files? For example, If I am making daily entries to my Home Accounting program, I am creating a new version of that data file each day. If I'm backing up files and folders daily and set my limit to 4, then Ghost will only retain the files for the past four times I entered and saved data.
By extension then, If I have no need to retain older data sets and need only the most recent data seta for backup purposes, then all I need to do is set the file limt to 1.
Can you think of any other reasons why someone in a home use environment might want to retain more than one version?
ynotadlog wrote:Am I correct in my understanding that here you are referring to versions of individual files? For example, If I am making daily entries to my Home Accounting program, I am creating a new version of that data file each day. If I'm backing up files and folders daily and set my limit to 4, then Ghost will only retain the files for the past four times I entered and saved data.
By extension then, If I have no need to retain older data sets and need only the most recent data seta for backup purposes, then all I need to do is set the file limt to 1.
Can you think of any other reasons why someone in a home use environment might want to retain more than one version?
It is of course a personal choice how many versions to maintain. But yes there are valid reasons why you should consider having more than one version. Consider some examples:
1) One day you make a lot of changes to a document and it gets backed up. Let's say a day or two later you realize you made a bunch of changes you really did not want to make. Having multiple versions would give you the flexibility to restore an earlier version of that document.
2) A virus infects a version of your document. If you had only one version and that was infected you may have trouble getting rid of that virus w/o risking the loss of the entire document.
3) A document gets corrupted (and it does happen occasionally). Again, with multiple versions you can restore a previous one. You lose perhaps some changes in the most recent version but not the entire document.
In the end, you should really consider this question. Why arbitrarily limit the number of versions to just one? In the normal case you would restore the most recent if needed. But in that case where this was not possible, you will be happy that you decided to keep more than one version.
This is even more important when it comes to image backups of your system drive; e.g., having multiple backup images as there are more things which can go wrong at the system level which might make it necessary to use something other than the most recent backup image.
Hope this helps.
Allen
It's clear now that "Versions" refer to the same file. I'll readjust it to 4.
I've already set the Drive Backups to create base files weekly with daily incremental backups. I've selected 4 as the limit to the number of base files in a series to be retained.
Only 10% of my C:\ 320 Gig Drive is utilized. My external backup drive is only 250 Gig. I need to monitor just how fast it fills up with the backup files. After four weeks I'll need to find the money to move up to a larger 500 Gig backup drive.