Destroying "only" your home directory (was Re: Newbie question on permissions)

[Alan McKinnon]

On Tuesday 04 April 2006 00:46, Michael T. Richter wrote:
> On Mon, 2006-03-04 at 22:28 +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote:
> > In Unix, a solution like that would be real easy. Install
> > CVS/SVN/whatever and create some user crons based on input from a
> > wizard. When the cron runs, it mounts the usb drive, submits all
> > of ~ to SVN, umounts the usb drive. You don't even need a big red
> > button. With a nice Gtk/Qt front end to do restores.
>
> Do you ever actually watch a user?  No, really.  I'm serious. 
> Hearing someone use "CVS" and "easy" together like that just makes
> me giggle uncontrollably.

That's the second time this week you've replied to a post of mine 
without properly reading my reply and the context it's in. Stop it. 
(The other case was in the thread "Dll vs Shared Library")

Go back and re-read your post then re-read my reply. You gave a 
longish story about your mum's travails with backups, including a 
Python script that you wrote, then described a solution she found 
involving a USB drive and a big red button. You ended with this 
comment:

"It can be done.  It has been done.  Just not under UNIX."

My reply follows immediately after that comment, I snipped the story 
of your Mum and I describe how it could be done under UNIX. Now, 
where exactly do I say that your Mum will have to set up SVN herself? 
Look again and see exactly what sentence I'm responding to.

I described one way that a developer - say, someone like you who can 
write Python scripts - could make an automated backup system. It 
installs it's own SVN and crons, and makes installation choices based 
on a wizard. Then runs daily, all without user intervention. Why 
CVS/SVN? Because it stores changes to files. Your mum stores big 
binary files - photos. They seldom change, so each commit is 
essentially just the new photos. Why cron? Because then your Mum does 
NOTHING to make it happen. Why unmount the USB drive after a backup? 
So your Mum can't wreck her storage with a misplaced command.

And yes, I do actually watch users. Very closely in fact. Daily. I 
train them. Daily.

Still giggling uncontrollably now?

-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan at linuxholdings dot co dot za
+27 82, double three seven, one nine three five