Download link: MyBackUp-1.0.0-MySoftware-Co.zip

User Instructions for MyBackup, version 1.0.0

Copyright (c) 1991 MySoftware Co. All Rights Reserved

 

We suggest you run MyBackup before reading these instructions beyond

section I. We feel the best way to learn the program is to use it. Our goal

is to develop software that is so easy to use that you can be up and running

in less than 5 minutes. Once you’re in the program you can press <F1> to

display additional help.

 

 

These Instructions are Divided into 6 Parts:

I HOW TO GET STARTED

II HOW TO USE MYBACKUP

III HELPFUL HINTS

IV IN CASE OF DIFFICULTY

V HOW TO GET HELP

VI TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

 

 

I HOW TO GET STARTED ………………………………………..

 

Hard Disk Users…

 

See the back of the Quick Start Card for instructions or just run the

install program from the original disk by typing INSTALL and pressing Enter.

 

Floppy Diskette Users…

 

We recommend that you make a working copy of the program by copying all

the files from the original to a blank formatted diskette.

 

Run Command…

 

From the DOS prompt type MBACKUP and press Enter.

 

 

 

II HOW TO USE MYBACKUP……………………………………..

 

 

WHAT IS MYBACKUP ???

 

MyBackup is a program you use to back up directories and files from your

hard disk onto diskettes. It will completely manage the backup process for

you, so that should your hard disk fail, or you accidently delete some

files, you can fully restore your data. MyBackup will not back up hard

disks to hard disks.

 

 

THE SCREEN

 

The screen is divided into 4 main areas:

 

1 Menu bar… the top row of the screen contains the menus for all

the main program functions.

 

2 Directory tree window… the upper left portion of screen displays

the structure of your hard disk. It’s called a tree since that is the

form hard disk directory structures take when you create subdirectories.

When you run MyBackup you are immediately put into this window. If

you have a color screen your position is marked by the red highlight,

if you’re using a monochrome monitor then your position is marked by

the inverse video highlight. To move to the File List Window press

the <Tab> key.

 

3 File list window… the lower left portion of screen displays all

the files in the currently selected directory, that is the directory

highlighted in the tree window.

 

4 Status window… right hand portion of screen, the top contains

information about your hard disk. If you are backing up, the

number of disks necessary to complete the backup is also shown.

 

The middle portion displays the shortcut keystrokes to quickly perform

a backup or restore. For instance, if you want to do a Full backup

just press the <Alt> and <A> keys simultaneously.

 

The bottom portion displays the “backup to”, “backup from”, “restore

to” and “restore from drives”. To change them, press <F8> and type in

the correct drives.

 

 

SIMPLE STRATEGY TO USE MYBACKUP

 

The first time you use MyBackup you should make a “Full Backup”, this

is the most complete backup you can do. This will copy the entire contents

of your hard disk to diskettes. You should have plenty of disks

available. They do not have to be formatted as MyBackup will format them

for you if they require it.

 

The next time you backup you can do a “Changes Only” backup. This will

copy only the files which have been changed or added since the last Full

backup. You want to do this to a different set of diskettes from the set

you did the full backup. Let’s create an example strategy. Say you want

to back up every day of the week. This table shows how you might go about

it.

 

Day Type of backup Disk Numbers

— ————- ————

Mon Full 1 thru 10

Tue Changes Only 11 thru 12

Wed Changes Only 13 thru 14

Thu Changes Only 15 thru 18

Fri Changes Only 19 thru 21

 

Next Monday you would start all over again by do doing a full backup

starting with disk #1 of your backup set.

 

With MyBackup, you can also back up selected files. You might think of

this as “archiving” files. Two functions are provided: First, a “Current

Directory” backup lets you highlight a directory and have all its files

backed up. Second, a “Marked files” backup lets you mark any files over

the entire hard disk and back up just these.

 

 

MAKING YOUR FIRST FULL BACKUP

 

If you should experience any unexpected problems during this initial

backup, please refer to the “CONFIRM THAT MYBACKUP IS SETUP CORRECTLY”

section below.

 

Let’s perform a Full backup. As noted above, this procedure will back up

all the files on your hard disk onto diskettes. From the menu bar at the

top of the screen press <F3>. A pull-down menu will appear. To select

“Full backup”, simply press <Enter> since it is already highlighted.

 

You should now see the “insert diskette” box on the screen. Note that in

the upper-right part of the screen, is an estimate of the number of

diskettes you’ll need. Be sure you have enough diskettes available. Also,

in the “insert diskette” box, you’ll see the diskette drive to which you’re

backing up. If this is not correct, please go to the “CONFIRM THAT MYBACKUP

IS SETUP CORRECTLY” section.

 

Now insert the first diskette in your diskette drive and press <Enter>.

MyBackup will begin backing up your files to this diskette. The

directory and file being backed up are highlighted on the screen. In

addition, you’ll see a backup progress gauge, which shows you what

percentage of your backup is complete.

 

You don’t need to pre-format your diskettes. If the diskette is

not formatted, MyBackup will format it for you.

 

When MyBackup is finished backing up to the first diskette, you will be

requested to insert the second diskette, and so forth. When the backup is

complete, you’ll be shown a summary of what you’ve backed up. At this point,

you can also request MyBackup to print out the report detailing which files

were backed up. It’s handy to print this report and keep it with your

backup set.

 

MyBackup puts your diskettes in numerical order beginning with diskette

number 1. It’s important that you write the number on each backup

diskette. This way, if you ever need to restore your files, you’ll know

which diskette is which.

 

 

MAKING YOUR FIRST “CHANGED FILES ONLY” BACKUP

 

This section describes how to make a “Changed files only” backup. You

should have previously performed a Full backup. A Changed file only backup

will only back up the files which have been added or changed since the last

Full or Changed files only backup.

 

From the menu bar at the top of the screen, press <F3> for Backup. A

pull-down menu will appear, to select “Changed files only”, press the

<down arrow> key to highlight this choice, press <Enter> to select it.

 

You will now see the “insert diskette” box on the screen. Note that in

the upper-right part of the screen, is an estimate of the number of

diskettes you’ll need. Be sure to have enough diskettes available. In

addition, the starting diskette number is shown. “Changed files only”

are additions to your full backup set.

 

Insert the requested diskette in the drive and press <Enter>.

MyBackup will now begin backing up only the changed files to this

diskette. The directory and file being backed up are highlighted on the

screen, as well as some useful statistics.

 

Remember that MyBackup puts your diskettes in numerical order beginning

with diskette number 1. For example, a Full backup might use diskettes one

through 12. Your first Changed files only backup might use diskettes 13

and 14, your second, only diskette 15.

 

You should keep a set number of diskettes to use for your Full and Changed

files only backups. After so many Changes only backups, you’ll have backed

up files to all or most of these diskettes. At this point, it is time to

begin anew with a Full backup.

 

NOTE: We recommend that you always use the same size and density diskettes

for doing full and changed files only backups. If you do your full backup

with 720K diskettes then do all subsequent Changed files only backups with

720K diskettes as well. Mixed diskette type backup sets are very difficult

to restore.

 

 

MAKING AN ARCHIVE BACKUP

 

If you want to back up only particular files on your hard disk, you can

use Current directory backup or Marked files backup. With Current directory

backup you will be requested to use the arrow keys to highlight the

directory to back up, and then press <Enter> to proceed.

 

With Marked files backup you will mark files that you wish to

back up. Use the arrow keys to highlight a directory or file to mark.

Press <Enter> to mark the directory or file. If the red cursor is in

the directory tree then all the files in the highlighted directory will be

marked. If the red cursor is highlighting a file, then that file will be

marked. The files are marked with the diamond character. When the files

you wish to back up have been marked, press <F10> to proceed.

 

Note that if you press <Enter> on a previously-marked file, it will be

unmarked. In addition, <Shift-Enter> or <Shift-space> will mark or unmark

all the files on your hard disk.

 

 

CONFIRM THAT MYBACKUP IS SETUP CORRECTLY

 

In the lower-right part of the screen, the drive to back up from and the

diskette to back up to are displayed. If either of these is not correct,

press <F8> and change the desired entry. Press <Esc> when you’re done.

 

Other options are listed in the Options menu. Press <F7> to view the

options menu. All the disk drive settings should be correct when you first

run the program. Highlighting a setting with the arrow keys and pressing

<Enter> will change the setting. The settings are:

 

1 Sound bell: When checkmarked, a short tune will play when the

“insert diskette” box is displayed.

 

2 High speed: When on, MyBackup will back up at a higher speed and

will be able to format diskettes as needed. In the rare event that

you should experience trouble backing up, you might try turning this

setting off which makes MyBackup work on some “non-standard” systems.

 

3 Drive A: type: This setting tells MyBackup the type of drive you have.

Important: This is not the type of diskette you are using, this is the

disk drive.

 

4 High density: Here you specify the type of diskette onto which you’ll

be backing up. This table shows you the proper settings:

 

Drive Diskette Density

—- ——- ——-

1.2M 360K Low

1.44M 720K Low

1.44M 1.44M High

 

5 Drive B: type: and High Density: Same descriptions as above but they

apply to the B: drive. Note that this setting will be “greyed-out”

if your system doesn’t have a second diskette drive. Also, if you

should have a third or forth diskette drive and wish to back up to

one of these, the setting for the B: drive will apply.

 

 

RESTORING DIRECTORIES AND FILES

 

Should you need to restore any files that have been backed up, MyBackup

provides several methods of restoring your files. If you need to restore

your entire hard disk, please refer to the “RESTORING YOUR ENTIRE HARD DISK”

section below.

 

From the menu bar at the top of the screen press <F5>. A pull-down

menu will appear. Select “File” to restore one particular file, select

“Current directory” to restore all the files in a particular directory,

or select “Marked files” to mark files to be restored.

 

MyBackup will ask you to insert the last diskette of your backup set. On

the last diskette, MyBackup keeps a list of which files have been backed up

and onto which diskettes. After reading this information, MyBackup will

display a directory tree of the backed up files on this set.

 

If you selected “File”, simply use the arrow keys to highlight the file

you wish to restore and press <Enter>.

 

If you selected “Current directory”, simply use the arrow keys to

highlight the directory you wish to restore and press <Enter>.

 

If you selected “Marked files”, MyBackup will ask you to mark the

directories and files that you wish to restore. You’ll mark files with the

<Enter> key. Use the <Tab> key to move between the directories and files.

Press <F10> when all the files you want to restore are marked.

 

Now, MyBackup will ask you to insert the necessary diskettes. MyBackup

will ask for the diskettes by number, for example, “insert diskette 5”.

You can see why it is important to number your diskettes!

 

If you have previously backed up more than one version of the same file,

MyBackup will restore only the most current version.

 

After the restoration is complete, MyBackup will display a summary screen

of what has been restored.

 

 

RESTORING YOUR ENTIRE HARD DISK

 

Restoring your entire hard disk is a very drastic step and should only be

performed if absolutely necessary. This step involves re-formatting your

hard disk and destroying all existing files on it. You should only perform

this step if you have reason to believe that the data on your hard disk is

unusable. NOTE THAT THIS PROCEDURE MAY DIFFER ACCORDING TO YOUR SYSTEM

SETUP. SINCE A RESTORE ALL IS A DRASTIC STEP YOU SHOULD INVOLVE THE PERSON

WHO SETUP YOUR SYSTEM IF YOU’RE NOT FULLY CONFIDENT IN YOUR KNOWLEDGE.

 

First, make sure you have a DOS diskette from which you can boot the

system as well as a diskette with the MyBackup program on it.

 

Second, insert the DOS diskette in the A: drive, and at the A> prompt,

type FORMAT C: /S and pressing <Enter>, which re-formats the C: drive and

places the system files on it. If you wish to restore to a different drive,

use that drive specifier instead of C:. NOTE: THIS PROCEDURE WILL DESTROY

ANY DATA ON YOUR HARD DISK - EVERYTHING WILL BE ERASED!

 

Third, insert the MyBackup diskette in the A: drive and start MyBackup by

typing MBACKUP and pressing <Enter>.

 

Fourth, press <F7> for Restore, then <Enter> for All. You will now be

requested to insert the last diskette of your backup diskettes. MyBackup

will read this diskette, and then request the other diskettes one-by-one.

When completed, MyBackup will display a summary of what you’ve done.

 

Fifth, you can now exit MyBackup. At this point should be able to access

your newly-restored files from your hard drive or re-boot your system.

If your system does not reboot then you may have formatted your hard disk

with a version of DOS different from the one which was backed up. To

correct this, first boot your PC from a DOS diskette, second, copy the

file COMMAND.COM from the diskette to your hard disk. Reboot your PC.

If it now reboots off the hard disk successfully copy the remaining DOS

files from your diskette to your hard disk. The remaining files should go

into a subdirectory such as C:\DOS.

 

 

III HELPFUL HINTS …………………………………………….

 

1. One of the nifty things about MyBackup is that directories and files are

stored on diskettes in their original format. This means that you don’t

even need MyBackup to restore the files. You can just use DOS to copy the

file from the backup diskette to your hard disk. Please refer to your

DOS manual for details.

 

2. If you need to stop the backup process before all your files have been

backed up, you can press <Escape>. MyBackup will stop only when it is

finished backing up to the current diskette. You will then have the choice

of documenting what you’ve done so far or returning to the program.

 

3. Perhaps every six months you might perform a backup which is taken

off-site for storage and safekeeping. In this case, mark all the files on

the drive with <F7> for Options, then ‘M’ for Mark all files. Now, press

<F3> for Backup, then ‘M’ for backing up all marked files. In this way,

you’ll make a complete backup of your system, but not affect your regular

sequence of Full and Changes only backups.

 

4. For your backup procedure, you might try this: Use two sets of backup

diskettes, each with the same number of diskettes. Use each set on

alternating weeks. Perform a Full backup on Mondays, and Changes Only

backups on Tuesday through Friday. Using this system, the most data you

could lose is one days worth. In addition, you have two sets of backups,

so that you have a very high assurance of recovering your data. All this

will take a little extra work.

 

5. MyBackup automatically performs complete verification during backup so

you can be assured that what was written is in fact readable. Although

this slows down the backup process, we feel that the extra time is worth it.

In fact, since MyBackup employs the latest, fastest and most reliable

technology for high-speed backups, you might not even think it is verifying

the format as well as the write operations … but it is!

 

6. In the Files List Window, you’ll also notice that some files have a

heart displayed at the far right hand side of the window. This means that

this file has been backed up. In technical terms, this means that it’s

archive attribute is off.

 

7. MyBackup always begins a backup by erasing the diskette. Thus, you

should only use diskettes that can be completely erased. Remember that

during a Changed Files Only backup, MyBackup will not append to the last

diskette that was in the drive the last time, but rather begin writing

to the next available diskette.

 

8. We do not recommend that you attempt to use low-density diskettes as

high-density diskettes! Low-density diskettes simply are not designed to

hold as much information as high-density diskettes.

 

9. This hint is to help you differentiate between low-density and high-

density diskettes. Physically, low-density (double density) and

high-density 5-1/4″ diskettes are the same although sometimes they have

labels to indicate their density. With 3-1/2″ diskettes, you’ll see an

additional small hole on high-density diskettes. This hole is on the

upper-right corner of the diskette if the diskette is held so that the

write-protect hole is facing you on the upper-left corner. A diskette

labeled “double-density” is, in fact, a low-density diskette. A diskette

labeled “HD” is a high-density diskette.

 

10. If you have diskette drives that are not “internal”, you’ll need to

turn off the high-speed setting. A diskette drive is not internal if it

does not use the same diskette controller as drive A:. Generally, this

situation might apply to very old systems with an upgraded diskette drive,

an AT system with more than two diskette drives, or a PS/2 system with an

external 5-1/4″ drive.

 

11. If you don’t know what kind of hardware (drives, diskettes, etc.) you

have, and you need to know, please ask for assistance from the person who

set up your computer.

 

 

IV IN CASE OF DIFFICULTY ……………………………………..

 

1 PROBLEM: MyBackup displays a disk error when initially trying to display

the hard disk directories.

TRY THIS: At the DOS prompt, type MBACKUP DOSREAD to use a more DOS-

compatible manner of reading hard disks. To revert to the faster,

standard manner, type MBACKUP FASTREAD.

2 PROBLEM: Screen colors look washed out or screen is blank.

TRY THIS: If you are running a monochrome monitor off of a color graphics

card run the program by typing MBACKUP CGA at the DOS prompt.

If you are running a monochrome monitor off of a VGA card then type

MBACKUP VGA at the DOS prompt. If you are running a monochrome

monitor off of a monochrome grahics card then type MBACKUP MONO at

the DOS prompt. These commands need only be typed once as MyBackup

will remember the setting you have chosen. To get back to automatic

setup type MBACKUP COLOR.

 

 

 

V HOW TO GET HELP ……………………………………………

 

Have you sent in your warranty registration card? If you have any

questions regarding MyBackup please have your serial and revision numbers

ready when you call. Our technical support staff can be reached at

415-325-9372 between 9am and 5pm Pacific Time. Your serial number is

located on the diskette label. Please have the program up and running

when you call.

 

 

VI TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS ……………………………………

 

Minimum System Requirements:

* DOS 2.0 or higher;

* 384K Memory