For Genealogists -- an illusion of security

During the past few days at the Mesa Regional Family History Center, we have had some lively discussions about transferring our genealogy files to work on a computer other than our own, particularly, bringing files to the Center for research purposes. This discussion brought up another old bugaboo, the illusion of security for backed up files.

The origin of this problem dates back into computer antiquity with the early versions of Personal Ancestral File. Primarily because of storage limitations on floppy disks, Personal Ancestral File has an option to create a compressed data file. The smaller compressed files allowed the user to store more names on the now ancient floppy disks. Because all storage at the time was on external floppy disks, the file menu item unfortunately was named "Backup." Over time, this choice of terms has turned out to be a really, really bad idea. As computers acquired internal hard drives and as memory storage went through a radical revolution, the venerable old PAF program still had its menu choice labeled "Backup."
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