GUI backup tools (was Re: Destroying "only" your home directory)

[Ari Torhamo]

ti, 2006-04-04 kello 14:58 -0500, Kenneth P. Turvey kirjoitti:

> I wouldn't expect all users to understand tar and friends, only the power
> users we spoke of.  For everyone else a complete backup is really the way
> to go, possibly excluding really big files that are backed up separately.

Doing a complite backup that fills one CD-RW (using a typical 8X speed)
is impractical to me. I just clocked the process and it took 10 minutes
20 seconds in my system. At present my backups take almost three full
CD-RWs. 

Although I'm just a regular user, I work a lot with my computer. I add
and edit many files during the day. I don't have a special photo day,
not a special file downloading day, not a special e-mail writing day,
etc. I may do all these things and more during the same day, so the
files I work with are scattered around my folder system and I have to
backup to all three CD-RWs. 

Is it the way to go in your opinion to spend more than 30 minutes every
day for backing up files? Is it the way to go to tell someone else
waiting for he's/her turn to use the computer: "I'm finnished here. I'll
just back up my stuff first - it'll only take 30 minutes"? I wouldn't
even want to keep my optical drive occupied for half an hour every day -
I'd rather use it for listening music, for example.

As it's been said many times, software gets better by listening what
people need, instead of telling them. I'm not worried though - there
seem to be quite a many listening ears around Ubuntu :-)

Ari