Backup
An
operation or procedure that copies data to an alternative location, so it can be
recovered if deleted or becomes corrupted. Depending on how often the data changes, how
valuable it is, and how long it takes to backup will determine how often
a backup is run. For example, a company with valuable information such as customer records that
change frequently may backup their data every day or in some cases every few
hours. Even more sensitive data such as bank records may be stored on drives
using some form of RAID, which helps protect the
data even if a drive fails.
Today, there are dozens of different ways to backup your information and mediums to keep your data. For example, CD-R, DVD-R, USB thumb drives, external drives, and in the cloud are some of the most popular places to backup your data.
- See the MS-DOS backup command page for additional information about the MS-DOS backup command.
Also see: Archive, Differential backup, Full backup, Incremental backup, Off-line storage
