tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post4846552301281050904..comments2024-03-18T15:34:34.751-07:00Comments on DBMS Musings: Why I no longer trust EMC [Update: maybe they are not so bad]Daniel Abadihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16753133043157018521noreply@blogger.comBlogger28125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-26764028819940424422011-12-19T07:51:52.066-08:002011-12-19T07:51:52.066-08:00We are under attack by DECHO, (Mozy). If you have ...We are under attack by DECHO, (Mozy). If you have anything that can help us. Please notify us at info@mozyup.com<br />Shalom ~ Jimmy<br />www.Mozyup.comMozyuphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04051929671339388516noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-27124711281477274982011-04-17T00:01:03.922-07:002011-04-17T00:01:03.922-07:00P.S. Here's link to the paper: http://www.hpl....P.S. Here's link to the paper: http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Mehul_Shah/papers/hotos11_2007_shah.pdf: Auditing to Keep Online Storage Services Honest.<br /><br />I realize that EMC fixed your problem, but there are many that would have not received the same attention. Perhaps that made you feel better about the cloud. But, there are innumerable stories of folks not being able to recover their data from all of the most "reliable" and well-known vendors. I don't see how ad-hoc public shaming is making much of a difference. Don't you think that a more principled approach other than bad publicity is needed here?Mehul Shahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12781391647704687311noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-53930188562980309472011-04-16T23:51:43.502-07:002011-04-16T23:51:43.502-07:00I'm interested in knowing whether this experie...I'm interested in knowing whether this experience changed your attitude toward the idea of auditing service providers. Do you think (a) internal auditing by experts would have helped you feel more comfortable about the service and the recoverability of the data (b) external auditing by automatic tools that checked the integrity of the data would have alerted you when there were signs of trouble.Mehul Shahhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12781391647704687311noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-33913244966351521292011-03-07T09:26:13.807-08:002011-03-07T09:26:13.807-08:00>After coming across this blog post, several &g...>After coming across this blog post, several >members of the Mozy technical team met with >each other to try to understand what happened[...]<br /><br />Hi Daniel,<br /><br /> I'm glad to hear you got your data back. I've quoted this snippet from your post, however, to make the point that I think your data would have ended up totally beyond recovery if not for the pressure felt by this blog post. The safeguards you speak of are likely not available to mere mortals.<br /> <br /> I find this post very timely in my own personal situation. I started the new year by treating myself to a system build for Windows 7. I picked an ASUS mobo, Core i5 7XX, maxed out main memory and attached 4 1TB SATA2 drives to the Intel RAID contoller on the mobo. I configured it in RAID10. That was the first week of January. Like a fool I did not buy extra hard drives and at $70.00 per unit I con't explain way. Nonetheless, I finally found a need to reboot this PC--the first time in over 80 days. During boot up I discovered my RAID configuration was in degraded mode as one of the SATA2 drives bit the dust. Given the murderously poor MTBF on these sorts of low-end drives I was totally at risk of suffering a double disk failure. If only the RAID controller had the ability to interrupt the OS to throw a system alert of some sort so I at least could have found out while the system was up. <br /><br /> I too heartily embrace the cloud and like you had at one point found yourself a bit short on personal testimony of the virtues of using cloud services so was I at the very moment I saw the word DEGRADED on the boot-time RAID status window of my PC. <br /><br /> What an odd coincidence that I found your blog post while Googling for social network content on Mozy and DropBox--the two cloud offerings I'm considering.<br /><br /> Oh well, so I ramble on in a comment thread of a two-week old post :-)<br /><br /> In short, thanks for the post. And, indeed, thanks for showing that social networking pressure can be felt by very large commercial companies.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-7052509863122389482011-02-24T03:30:03.380-08:002011-02-24T03:30:03.380-08:00Hallo daniel,
Cloud computing is een goede technie...Hallo daniel,<br />Cloud computing is een goede techniek en is het risico vrij om het verlies van de belangrijke gegevens.Ik heb een ervaring met een bedrijf, doen ze <a href="http://www.rse.nl/recovery.html" rel="nofollow"> data recovery </a> werken in meer verantwoorde manier.Elmashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17541190421684251913noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-11392733257186934922011-02-19T13:41:39.772-08:002011-02-19T13:41:39.772-08:00Gee, I was even thinking of switching from Carboni...Gee, I was even thinking of switching from Carbonite to Mozy, because Carbonite had been less than prompt about answering some questions and such. But when I did lose the contents of my disk, clear it off and re-install Windows, Carbonite restored the whole thing just fine. Of course it's probably not a good idea to draw sweeping conclusions from a very small number of anecdotes, but I'm not comfortable telling people to use Mozy after having read this. (I'm using the basic monthly-fee plan at Carbonite. For my desktop I also have an external drive; belt and suspenders. I didn't have that during the aforementioned meltdown.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-26929862634286347572011-02-18T06:41:29.302-08:002011-02-18T06:41:29.302-08:00In addition try out Wuala.com, made in Swiss. Moun...In addition try out Wuala.com, made in Swiss. Mount your cloud space as a volume and copy / sync your files to it.Alexanderhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00804602465627761983noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-31974555104680843552011-02-16T08:47:41.564-08:002011-02-16T08:47:41.564-08:00I have had great experience with CrashPlan.com and...I have had great experience with CrashPlan.com and would highly recommend them.Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02288214128269865161noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-49393915140939711592011-02-16T04:59:18.341-08:002011-02-16T04:59:18.341-08:00I use http://rsync.net/ to push my critical files ...I use http://rsync.net/ to push my critical files to a standard offsite filesystem. When I've had to run a restore (only once, accidental corruption of my encrypted drive) rsync could not have been more helpful. They produced a tar for me so I could readily download the whole backup in one go rather than file by file. I can't recommend them highly enough, for my most trusted files, I only use http://rsync.net/<br /><br />PS> OpenID on this comment form appears to be broken, at least for me.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-80675403383835706222011-02-16T04:01:10.278-08:002011-02-16T04:01:10.278-08:00/nelson mode on
"Ha Ha"
/nelson mode o.../nelson mode on<br /><br />"Ha Ha"<br /><br />/nelson mode offUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05872861715049631517noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-25586331124126037612011-02-16T03:50:42.164-08:002011-02-16T03:50:42.164-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.James Levinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08252814823531174708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-8358253960661565392011-02-15T20:42:40.436-08:002011-02-15T20:42:40.436-08:00AltDrive.com has unlimited backup for your Windows...AltDrive.com has unlimited backup for your Windows, Mac or Linux machines. Works like a champ.S. Joanouhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03248478156247410296noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-59096191477247616202011-02-15T20:39:41.831-08:002011-02-15T20:39:41.831-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.S. Joanouhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03248478156247410296noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-44264920618016101622011-02-15T13:15:11.189-08:002011-02-15T13:15:11.189-08:00check out crashplan.com. it is MUCH better than M...check out crashplan.com. it is MUCH better than MOZYUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01002522107414904879noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-8996967125052008492011-02-15T11:59:43.703-08:002011-02-15T11:59:43.703-08:00"The problem was not with Mozy, but with his ..."The problem was not with Mozy, but with his own employer's delays in replacing the laptop. If he needs more than 30 days of storage, he needs to pay for it."<br /><br />I couldn't disagree more. The problem (for users only, of course) is that Mozy doesn't really care if you can receive the notification that they're about to delete all your data.<br /><br />Paid or free, one or four back-ups, none of that matters. If Mozy actually cared about their users, they'd ensure that you could be notified. Either by one or two email addresses or by telephone or text.<br /><br />Notifying a user that you're about to delete their data, is no trivial issue. Saying, "oh well, we tried to msg you through your dead laptop, but you never responded, so too bad..."<br /><br />What a "policy" for happy customers and profitable business. What a joke. You're telling me none of their so-helpful engineers foresaw exactly this scenario, and didn't care to integrate alternate methods of customer contact?<br /><br />And only now, they've graciously decided to "make some changes"? That a company whose only product is safe and reliable back-up, can't bother to legitimately notify customers of impending deletion...Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-55553594123954680282011-02-15T11:47:37.573-08:002011-02-15T11:47:37.573-08:00"The problem was that my computer with the Mo..."The problem was that my computer with the Mozy software installed had failed, so the software couldn't notify me."<br /><br />This is inexcusable incompetence, hardly an honest oversight, and for that decision alone (by Mozy), I would never trust them again.<br /><br />They want me to believe, that their upcoming-deletion-warning would/could only be delivered via the computer that would very likely be offline because of disk failure?! Not even an email to an external acct?! Come on...<br /><br />The only reason they jumped up to help you, is because you publicized your experience on the WWW. Had you not done that, I've no doubt that all you would have ever received from them, would be their canned, brush-off template-mail.<br /><br />I highly suspect the internal policy at Mozy, is actually, "ha, screw the free users, we don't owe them anything, it's all about forcing people to pay..." like even the way you're able to contact them, to get their mistake sorted out. It's a form of extortion, IMO.<br /><br />As another commenter said, I do my own backups, to my own local hardware. I save the rip-off prices that cloud storage "providers" charge, plus exactly these kind of disasters when the day comes that I'd actually need to rely on them.<br /><br />Cloud storage (value) is like web hosting now, you can't really know what you're getting out of the deal until the sh*t hits the fan, and then it may well be way too late.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-6513094386820063922011-02-15T11:40:01.996-08:002011-02-15T11:40:01.996-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Ariel Weisberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17715602499570554528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-7288928610640214972011-02-15T10:01:20.641-08:002011-02-15T10:01:20.641-08:00I've been using Hybir backup for online + offl...I've been using Hybir backup for online + offline backup. The application can backup to multiple locations, including their online service. So I have a local ioMega NAS plus the online backup service. They keep your data as long as you pay.<br /><br />Plus, Hybir does an image backup so you can use a boot CD to restore your HDD to the exact state it was in at the time of the backup. They de-dupe across all their clients so for online backup you only have to upload a small percent of your total data as much if (like Windows 7 files) will already be in their repository.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-34996840845027810672011-02-15T09:41:29.858-08:002011-02-15T09:41:29.858-08:00Lots of companies, including Mozy, delete free acc...Lots of companies, including Mozy, delete free accounts when a customer stops using it. I don't see anything unusual there. Of course, Mozy will never delete a paid account as long as the customer is paying the bills.<br /><br />Of course, we are only talking about backup data. One can assume the original copies are still available. The odds of losing BOTH the original files plus the backup copies at the same time are remote. Not impossible, but hopefully rare. In any case, everything was always under control of Daniel Abadi. He seems to be blaming the wrong organization. The problem was not with Mozy, but with his own employer's delays in replacing the laptop. If he needs more than 30 days of storage, he needs to pay for it.<br /><br />In addition, he only had ONE backup??? That's an invitation for disaster. He needs at LEAST two backups at all times, stored in different places. Three or four backups would be better. (I have at least four backups of everyone of my important files, stored in three different places.)<br /><br />I think Daniel Abadi is too quick to complain about others when, in fact, he isn't doing what he should be doing. Mozy should be just one of the tools that he uses, not his complete protection plan. Any data professional will tell you that you NEVER rely on any one backup. He placed all his eggs in one basket and now he is paying the price for it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-31442730578081195622011-02-15T08:26:51.864-08:002011-02-15T08:26:51.864-08:00I use S3 with Arq from Haystack Software..works on...I use S3 with Arq from Haystack Software..works only on the mac though. You could find something equivalent for lin/winSriharihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14361848716204134668noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-24892442832029355052011-02-15T08:20:09.750-08:002011-02-15T08:20:09.750-08:00The Mozy free service is limited to 2GB of data. I...The Mozy free service is limited to 2GB of data. I don't quite see how you managed to backup your Sony laptop using this paltry amount. <br /><br />If you only have 2GB of valuable data, I now amend my previous advice. Invest in a USB memory stick. They come free with some boxes of breakfast cereals or as freebies at trade shows.Andy Chttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14678100354619214546noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-16781970996901391672011-02-15T08:08:38.260-08:002011-02-15T08:08:38.260-08:00Buy a 1TB external drive. They cost about $50.Buy a 1TB external drive. They cost about $50.Andy Chttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14678100354619214546noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-5140537306789532182011-02-15T07:50:36.115-08:002011-02-15T07:50:36.115-08:00Thank you all for your comments.
oraclesponge: If...Thank you all for your comments.<br /><br />oraclesponge: If their official policy is six months, then maybe I have some legal options. I had used Mozy's Website to access individual files within the last month, and had done a backup within the last two months. Also, they had my e-mail address, but they definitely did not e-mail me.<br /><br />arch0njw: EMC has had 4 years to incorporate the acquisition. I feel it is fair to criticize EMC for the business and technical processes of Mozy at this point. If EMC is unwilling to take responsibility for its subsidiaries at this point, the users of EMC's other subsidiaries should not feel secure that they are owned by EMC.<br /><br />Seth: I think Amazon understands the cloud much better than EMC. I have not heard of cases of Amazon losing their customers' data. Though I can certainly better understand your hesitation now.Daniel Abadihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16753133043157018521noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-2839647189466817002011-02-15T07:41:59.155-08:002011-02-15T07:41:59.155-08:00I did an 80 gig test restore with Backblaze recent...I did an 80 gig test restore with Backblaze recently. It didn't go well.<br /><br />They force you to materialize a subset of your files into a zip archive. The materialization process takes tens of minutes. Once the archive is materialized you are given the URL via a javascript button so you can't use a download manager. The URL is not reusable so you can't start the download to find the URL and then use a download manager. If the download fails (and it will) you have to start from the beginning.<br /><br />You are limited to materializing a maximum of two archives and they are deleted 7 days after materialization. Whatever you can download in 7 days is the limit on what you can materialize in a single archive.<br /><br />I emailed support and they told me about an undocumented utility that will reliably transfer the archives and allow resuming. <br /><br />It is shocking that they haven't streamlined the process given the age of the product. I don't see why customers should be bothered with implementation details like materializing archives and reliably transferring files. My only guess is that restores are not where they make their money unless you are considering paying $189 for a whopping 400 gigabyte hard drive.<br /><br />I also found that Vista's built in zip functionality chokes on archives greater then 4gb and produces 0 length files for all files beyond 4gb. I emailed them and said they should document that bug as well as the utility for reliable restores, but I haven't gotten a response and there hasn't been any updates to their website.<br /><br />Hanlon's razor and all, but this makes me think that they are trying to drive people towards the pay services when they are most desperate. I can't see how that makes business sense since the number of people doing restores must be dominated by the number of people silently backing up data.<br /><br />I will continue to use Backblaze to capture the tail of my data, and supplement that with an external USB drive or two so that I have two local copies.Ariel Weisberghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17715602499570554528noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8899645800948009496.post-64378572037524907282011-02-15T07:30:46.272-08:002011-02-15T07:30:46.272-08:00Eh, I'm having doubts about the cloud myself.
...Eh, I'm having doubts about the cloud myself.<br /><br />In the process of moving from a traditional data center to Amazon's AWS with all data stored with Amazon.<br /><br />I'm scared we're putting all of our eggs in one basket and that basket isn't as strong as we're led to believe.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com