SF.net SVN: safekeep: [278] website/trunk/WebContent/motivation.shtml

[<di...@us...>]

Revision: 278
          http://safekeep.svn.sourceforge.net/safekeep/?rev=278&view=rev
Author:   dimi
Date:     2007-01-11 20:09:52 -0800 (Thu, 11 Jan 2007)

Log Message:
-----------
Write up the motivation page.

Modified Paths:
--------------
    website/trunk/WebContent/motivation.shtml

Modified: website/trunk/WebContent/motivation.shtml
===================================================================
--- website/trunk/WebContent/motivation.shtml	2007-01-11 23:29:30 UTC (rev 277)
+++ website/trunk/WebContent/motivation.shtml	2007-01-12 04:09:52 UTC (rev 278)
@@ -5,22 +5,64 @@
 <div id="PageMenu">
     <span class="PageMenuTitle">On This Page:</span>
     <a href="#intro">Introduction</a> /
-    <a href="#adhoc">What's wrong with ad-hoc scripts?</a>
+    <a href="#why">Why yet another backup program?</a> /
 </div>
 
 <a name="intro"></a>
 <h2>Introduction</h2>
+<p>
+Every once in a while you read on a random Internet forum of a poor 
+soul complaining that program XYZ eat his data for lunch. Invariably,
+there is someone there to ask: "You do keep regular backups, don't you?".
+You can almost see the smirk on their faces when they ask this irrelevant
+question, knowing full well that most likely the person did not do 
+any regular backups.
+</p>
 
 <p>
-TODO
+Truth of the matter is that most people don't do regular backups,
+yet few people admit to it. Skipping this essential step of protecting
+such a valuable asset seems reckless or lazy at best, and that doesn't
+sit well with most folks.
 </p>
 
-<a name="adhoc"></a>
-<h2>What's wrong with ad-hoc scripts?</h2>
+<p>
+Why do people have such a difficult time understanding the need for
+implementing such a simple and basic procedure that can save them
+from untold grief? I used to blame the people as lazy, until I realized 
+I didn't keep regular backups! In fact, I come to realize that it is
+not such a simple and basic procedure after all. Shouldn't it be?
+</p>
 
+<a name="why"></a>
+<h2>Why yet another backup program?</h2>
 <p>
-TODO
+Soon after setting up shop as a Linux company, we faced the unavoidable
+task of backing up our data. More importantly, our clients that deployed 
+Linux based systems needed a backup solution. We figured that this was
+a "solved" problem, so we took a quick look around for something that
+would satisfy our quite reasonable requirements:
+<ul>
+  <li>Must be under an accepted Open Source License</li>
+  <li>Security is important, even on a LAN</li>
+  <li>Good error handling, data is important</li>
+  <li>Take advantage of modern features, like LVM snapshoting</li>
+  <li>Bandwidth efficient, it may be used over slower links</li>
+</ul>
 </p>
 
+<p>
+It turns out that the offer is a little underwhelming. The only one
+that came reasonably close to what we needed was <tt>rdiff-backup</tt>,
+but that needed work to do what we needed it to do. And so we went
+ahead and did the work for our own internal purposes.
+</p>
 
+<p>
+The end result of our efforts is SmartKeep. We decided to free the
+code in the hope that others will find it useful. If you do, please
+send us your impressions and suggestions at
+<a href="mailto:saf...@li...">saf...@li...</a>.
+</p>
+
 <!--#include virtual="footer.shtml" -->


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