Selecting Files in Express

[dipietri]

Can no one at Retrospect figure out that maybe, just maybe, end users like myself might like to perform the simple and obvious task of selecting certain folders and files to exclude (or include) in their backup? I am backing up daily to a USB external HD from my PC HD, and this offers economy, simplicity, and utility. (Totally unattended backup, no CD's to fumble with, label, and lose, etc.). But I cannot select folders or files to include or exclude from my backup. The "methods" of file and folder selection offered by the Retrospect Express software are crude, cumbersome, and totally ineffective. You are led down a blind alley, with a Windows type directory tree having check mark selectors and all, but when you finished selecting...voila! No way to save your work and you back to All Files, or OS Files, or the ridiculous "No Files" canned selectors in the Express software. For years I used Seagate Backup Exec with tremendous ease and nearly flawless execution. Now with Windows XP I needed something else. Sorry, but Retrospect Express isn't the answer I was looking for.

 

 

[lv2ski]

If you would like to specify directories as sources for backup, we have to define them as subvolumes.

 

 

 

When you are in the confirmation window for an Immediate backup (Ready to Execute), or when you are editing your scripted backup, click on the Sources button which will take you to the Volume Selection window.

 

 

 

Highlight the hard drive containing the folders you would like to backup, and click the Subvolume button.

 

 

 

Navigate to the folder you would like to backup, and click Define.

 

 

 

You can now select this folder as a source to be backed up, instead of the entire hard drive.

 

 

 

Repeat this process if you would like to define more than one Subvolume.

 

 

 

To select more than one subvolume for backup, use Ctrl + click to highlight multiple folders.

 

 

 

Then to pick files you can go to the Files Chosen button and pick the files you wish to backup.

 

 

 

Another way is, in our Desktop product we have custom selectors. You can basically, build your own selector that excludes or includes what ever you wish.

[dipietri]

Thanks for the instruction in this. I will try to use this feature you describe. There is no such detail either in the help feature of the software, or the instruction booklet that came with the software.

 

 

 

When I was an engineering college student there were hand held calculators made by Hewlett Packard, and then there were everyone else's calculators. Hewlett Packard used a rather odd "back door" approach of entering data, which was cynically referred to among the engineering students as "Reverse Polish Notation". Although the calculators were high quality, the method of data entry was cumbersome and against all known conventions, causing them to lose market share and eventually all but die out. Could Retrospect's method of file selection be the backup software equivalent of HP's Reverse Polish Notation?

 

 

 

A recommendation to your software development people: Take a nod from B. Gates (although he is not exactly admired fully by me) in developing a simple Windows-like directory tree with check boxes beside the directories and files. Check means include the file in the backup, no check means exclude the file from the backup. You are done. Your users are happy. Your sales go up. You are happy.