Ever lost important files?

I'm sure you've had this happen - you're in the middle of a paper. You're working hard and things are going good. You step away from your computer for some grub and a night away, and by the time you come back - POOF! - your computer it blue screened (I know, I know, Mac users probably don't have this....but until someone buys me a Mac, I'm sticking with the cheap Windows that meets my needs) and you're stuck with the last auto-save that Office did (if it can recover it).

This is why you need to BACK STUFF UP. I personally use SyncToy to back my laptop up to my server. But I've come to the realization lately that it's not enough. What happens if my stuff gets stolen? What if I want to go back to an older revision and I've overwritten it? The solution? Off-site backup.

There are a number of ways to do this, and an even greater number of online places to do this: Amazon's S3, Microsoft's SkyDrive, Carbonite, and Mozy. I'm using Mozy. This is for a number of reasons:

1. Price. It's FREE for 2GB of online storage. Yes, free. No strings attached. Obviously, 2GB isn't enough to store a music collection, or a full set of home videos, etc, but it's PLENTY for me to save all my school work and other important documents. If you really need the extra space, they offer unlimited backup for $4.95/month.
2. Location. I'm a Utahn, born and bred. If I can support a homegrown company versus Amazon or MS, I will.
3. I know employees. The company is solid.
   
4. Encryption. It's safe and secure.
5. Block-level incremental backups. This is cool. This method only backs up the blocks within the file that changed, rather than copying the whole file.

Convinced?
Go to Mozy.com to sign up for an account and download their software. It's free. You can thank me later.

Are you a university student? Want Server 2003/2008 for free?

Two posts in one day? What?

Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition
This is available from Microsoft's Dreamspark website. Windows Server 2003 is specifically designed for a server environment, but can easily be configured to use as a workstation. Once configured as a workstation, it is basically Windows XP, but a more secure code revision. Windows XP drivers nearly always work perfectly on Server 2003, with very very few exceptions. Users also report gaming performance is equal to Windows XP, and better than Vista.

Windows Server 2008
Available through Dreamspark (see above), instructions here to configure it to workstation so it looks more like Vista except without the bloat.

Thanks to various people on SlickDeals.net (the best deals site, IMO) for the info. I've gotten a key from Dreamspark for 2008, and will grab one for 2003 here soon.

Carlos Boozer

It's not often that I stray from my geek and Office musings, but I came across something that I think is hilarious and I wanted to share.

Few things in my life are more important than Utah Jazz basketball and BYU athletics. So, it's only natural that these loves of my life (or frustrations, in the case of BYU sports this year, but that's a whole separate post) come into my blog.

The MOST frustrating player on the Jazz by far is Carlos Boozer. His "matador" defense (or lack thereof) is unreal. Whether it's just laziness, inability, stupidity, or something else is the big million dollar question. Added to this lack of 'D' is his, as of late, inability to do much on the offensive end makes this the $12M question.

This flowchart (stolen from this guy) explains what must go through his head some nights.

I'm just not sure it's worth paying a guy $12M for his yelling ability ("And One!"), and lets be honest, you pay me even $1M and I'm going to work my tail off to get better, not work my tail off to sit on the bench.

VBA is....interesting

VBA is powerful. I'm in an intro to VBA class at BYU this semester which has been pretty awesome. There's a bit of stuff you can do in VBA to make Excel and other apps pretty smooth. The IDE sucks though. Pretty bad.

Maybe I'm spoiled, having learned C# in VS2008. Maybe I'm just a sucker for a pretty face, and VS definitely has that. Eiter way, using the built-in IDE and looking at the standard forms, the only thing I can think is "This would look SO much better in C#." Problem is that my final has to be done in VBA. I considered importing a C# project as an activex control and sneaking around it that way, but decided that would probably earn me a great grade for creativity, and a bad grade for everything else.

I mean, who wants a form that looks this bland?

Oh well. This is a screenshot from my final project, a tax client tracking tool for my dad. It can invoice, create/email reports, email reminders, etc.

The Office Quote of the Day

It seems I unintentionally took a break from blogging. I'll be back soon, I promise. I'm working on a VBA app right now for my dad (it won't be pretty, but it should be functional), and finishing up MyLibrary (both are projects for school).

While I do that, one of my most favorite quotes from the Office came up on my calendar:
"I am taking responsibility. It is up to me to get rid of the curse that hit Meredith with my car. I'm not superstitious. But I am a little stitious."

-Michael