Technology Tuesday: Safeguarding Your Data
From Information Resources and Technologies
How would the permanent loss of information stored on your computer affect you?
There are many ways you unintentionally can lose information on a computer. A handful of times each year, Information Resources and Technologies sees hard drive failure and computer theft which results in total data loss. For the faculty, staff or student who uses their computer hard drive as their primary storage space, this can mean the loss of years of work. To prevent data loss from happening, we recommend establishing your own process for saving essential data to UST’s shared file space or backing up your data to external media. If you regularly make backup copies of your files and keep them in a separate place, you can get some, if not all, of your information back in the event something happens to your computer.
Shared file space
Backing up data is one of the most important, yet also one of the most neglected areas of computing. IRT wants to make this process easy for you; to do this we provide shared file storage space on the UST network that is backed up nightly. When you use the shared file space you have the added assurance that your files are backed up on a regular basis, unlike your desktop which could fail causing considerable time and frustration in lost data. IRT offers the following options for storing your data on a shared file space.
Shared File Space
Recommended Use
Quota
MyStorage
MyStorage is the name of the central storage directory at UST created for all students, faculty, and staff.
500 MB of storage space is available.
Acadstore
AcadStore is used for faculty and student academic document sharing and collaboration.
Quotas are not currently used in this environment.
CourseWeb
CourseWeb is the central location for all academic Web materials housed externally from BlackBoard.
Quotas are not currently used in this environment.
BlackBoard
BlackBoard is the primary Web space of online academic resources.
250 MB of storage space is available for course sites.
110 MB of storage space is available for Community Organization sites.
DeptStore
Deptstore is the central storage directory for departments.
Quotas are not currently used in this environment.
Computer Back-Up to External Media
Backing up to external media is the preferred method for large amounts of data. If you haven’t decided already where you want to store your backup copies; external hard disk drive, CDs, DVDs, or some other storage format and you want to know more about your options, IRT can help. IRT recommends the following options based on the amount of data you would like to back up or archive.
Back-up Option
Recommended Use
Quota
CD-R or CD-RW
CDs are recommended for a straight archive of data from your primary hard drive.
700 MB
DVD+/-R
DVDs are recommended for a straight archive of data from your primary hard drive.
4.7 GB
External Hard Drive
An external hard drive offers the greatest amount of back-up space.
80+ GB
USB Thumb Drive
A USB thumb drive or USB key should be used for transporting and storing small amounts of data.
* Make sure you aren’t storing sensitive information on your thumb drive as these can be easily lost or stolen.
128 MB – 2GB
More Information
Instructions for backing up to MyStorage are available online.
Questions?
Contact the IRT Tech Desk, (651) 962-6230, or schedule an appointment with your Academic Technology Consultant or your Administrative CORE Team Consultant to discuss the various back up options and determine the best solution for your needs.
