Gerry Kirk

Churches and other non-profits have important, critical data that should be backed up on a scheduled basis, stored at a reliable source off-site. I suspect, tho that most churches backup process is like this:

1. Backups happen sporadically
2. Not all important files are backed up
3. Backup files are stored on the same computer as the original, or on a disk or something semi-reliable.
4. Backup files are kept in the office.

Apple’s statistics show that only 4% of Mac users have an automatic backup strategy. I doubt churches are any better.
To be fair, my own backup strategy is full of holes. I’ve tried setting up an automated backup using rsync to copy changed files to an external hard drive, but that means turning on the external drive in time for the backup, and for some reason rsync seems to copy everything, not just the changed stuff so it takes forever.
If doing backups were as simple as typing out a Word document, more organizations would be doing it, including myself!
Amazon’s new Simple Storage Service (S3) offers a partial way there. S3 is an Internet “web service” that permits you to store unlimited data on their very robust, highly secure system. This is the system they use, as well as corporations like Microsoft. Rates, currently, are 15 cents per GB stored a month and 20 cents per GB transferred.
A church with 10GB of data that adds 0.5GB of new data per month would pay approximately less than $10 for the whole year of secure, off-site storage. That’s cheap. No other online storage service compares right now.
Still, that doesn’t solve the problem entirely of getting files backed up regularly. S3 provides the storage, not the tool to backup the data.
In another post I’ll list some tools that make it easy to backup with S3. I haven’t looked yet, so Google don’t let me down. 🙂

Technorati Tags: backup, amazon s3

SooToday is a very popular online community site where I live. They have a classifieds section that gets lots of traffic. I once posted looking for a cheap pre-paid cell phone, and got 8 emails within a day or so.
Trying to find deals on SooToday is an effort in aggravation. Think Myspace design (or lack thereof). Where to start?

1. There is only one search field and it is at the bottom of a very long classifieds front page. Want to do another search? Click the back button a few times, or bookmark the page. Yuck.
2. No searching by category. Type in ‘rug’ and you get everything from houses for sale, to stereo equipment, when all you want to buy is an area rug. The search will match any posting with the letters ‘rug’ in sequence, so ‘drug’ and ‘rugged’ match.
3. Browsing is useless, because it’s possible that someone posted in a different category than the one you think you should find it in. For example, there are Miscellaneous and Freebie categories.
4. Duplicate postings. Everyone wants their posting to be at the top of the list since no one browses more than a page, so the same ads keep showing up day after day.
5. Time consuming. This is a general criticism of classifieds sites. Why make me come to the site every day / hour? Why can’t I sign up for notification when something I want gets posted? I don’t have time to be searching regularly.

First attempt: Google Alerts
I tried using Google Alerts for a while. It’s simple and easy to use. You type in something you are looking for, and when new items show up in the top 20 results, you get emailed. For example, to search for a cordless phone, use this as your google search:

“cordless phone” site:www.sootoday.com/content/classifieds

The problem I soon discovered is I got the results too late. I would get a notification days after the ad went up, and by that time, the item was sold or not even listed on the site anymore! The problem is that the search depends on Google updating its search index, which can happen days later it seems.
Eureka!

Then I came across Dapper, an amazing tool that lets you build data maps from content on web sites. In short time, I created a ‘Dapp’ of SooToday classifieds, and built a search around it. Now I get results sent to me soon after they get posted. I use RSS feeds but email notification is also possible. This is my holy grail. It’s awesome.

We just bought a house recently and are expecting twins, so I’m searching for quite a few items. Using my Dapp I was able to spot some bamboo flooring, regularly priced around $6 sq ft for only $2. I’ve checked out a few dishwashers, called about a number of desks, and followed up on some moving sales.
Try out my SooToday classifieds search Dapp yourself. Here is the link to create an email notification (account required), and one to create an RSS feed of search results.
Perhaps I’ll create another post that provides an example of creating the alert or RSS feed, if people indicate interest. Let me know what you think of it.

Technorati Tags: classifieds, alerts, dapper, sootoday

Google is now packaging together 4 of their services in a connected bundle for organizations:

• Gmail for email
• Gtalk for instant messaging
• Google Calendar for managing schedules and events
• Google Page creator for web pages

My first thoughts after reading this is that churches and dioceses can benefit well just by switching to Gmail, and ignoring the rest for now. Consider that:

• You get an email account that has solid spam protection
• Access email from anywhere
• Power of Google’s search for your email
• For those that want to still use a desktop email client, that is possible also. You still benefit from the spam protection as well.
• Ditch your own mail server if you have one and save on time and $$$
• Very easy to adminster email accounts
• It’s free!

More info at https://www.google.com/a/

Technorati Tags: Google Apps, email