Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2012/08/22

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Subject: [Leica] Amazon's long-term storage
From: spencer at aotera.org (Spencer Cheng)
Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2012 00:27:34 -0400
References: <B35F26E1-1B26-45C3-9B64-017447B9EF0F@mac.com> <58F172C8-AE31-4DC6-A961-011D686B9370@aotera.org> <77435976-AED2-40D5-BE31-5BA072D0784E@mac.com> <726BE5AD-416F-4021-A1CB-E16E0093684D@aotera.org> <CAH1UNJ0pDaNq7KYT1nE4GpzVYeZCLi=HXGas8oBUVzrRwabNOA@mail.gmail.com>

To me, at this moment, no, because it is very new and unproven. Is the 
technology reasonably sound? Probably since tape is well-established 
technology. Is their disaster recovery plans adequate? Unknown since Amazon 
hasn't said what it is other than some vague handwaving about multi-site 
replication. That magic 99.99999999% I would classify as purely marketing 
material until Amazon discloses how it is calculated. Can they guarantee 
data recovery for at least 20-50 years? No idea.

If you have no other location where you can store data (office, home, 
friend's place), it might be worth a try. Uploading lots of photos (say RAW 
files @ 20MB each) will take quite a while with residential broadband 
connections is also a consideration.

Regards,
Spencer

On Aug 22, 2012, at 23:06, Jayanand Govindaraj <jayanand at gmail.com> wrote:

> I do not understand all this nit picking - my only question is: "is it
> technologically good enough for an offsite backup - an additional safeguard
> to normal backups?" If it is, it is worth it. It is not as if our work is
> indispensable as of now to the world at large. If our data is good enough
> to preserve, someone will find a way to do it.
> Cheers
> Jayanand
> 
> On Thu, Aug 23, 2012 at 1:33 AM, Spencer Cheng <spencer at aotera.org> 
> wrote:
> 
>> Hi Adam,
>> 
>> According to the National Archive in Canada, the only archival medium
>> suitable for 100 years is acid-free paper or microfiche. Our national
>> census data which has to be stored for 75 years by law is delivered to the
>> Archive on paper as far as I know.
>> 
>> My preference is for laser-etched granite tablets. ;-)
>> 
>> Modern tape drives have their own ECC scheme when they write data. Amazon
>> would have to constantly copy the data in order to ensure that any of the
>> tapes hasn't gone bad. Modern tapes are much improved over the DAT drives 
>> I
>> used 15 years ago but they certainly are not archival quality.
>> 
>> Keeping any system up for 99.999% time is a major struggle requiring very
>> complex engineering. My imagination is significantly stretched by
>> 99.99999999%. It definitely sounds like marketing speak. :)
>> 
>> Regards,
>> Spencer
>> 
>> On Aug 22, 2012, at 15:16, Adam Bridge <abridge at mac.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> You shouldn't really be surprised, Spencer. If data redundancy is built
>> into the storage - lots of extra bits to allow for recoverable data - then
>> you'd get the durability that Amazon quotes.
>>> 
>>> You're guessing that they store on tape. That might be true but for
>> long-term storage tape isn't an ideal candidate. However it's stored,
>> Amazon says they have a technology, or a growth path for technology, that
>> will keep your data alive and available for the indefinite future.
>>> 
>>> Looks pretty attractive to me.
>>> 
>>> Adam
>>> 
>>> On Aug 21, 2012, at 6:12 PM, Spencer Cheng <spencer at aotera.org> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> Sounds nice. Sounds a bit too good to be true. I would guess Amazon
>> stores the data on tape on multiple sites.
>>>> 
>>>> "Amazon Glacier is designed to provide average annual durability of
>> 99.999999999% for an archive"
>>>> 
>>>> I am surprised that that level of durability is possible on perishable
>> media (and I don't really believe it :).
>>>> 
>>>> One aspect of archival storage of digital data which is often
>> overlooked is that digital data has to be regularly transcribed/converted
>> to a current format for the archive to be useful.
>>>> 
>>>> Regards,
>>>> Spencer
>>>> 
>>>> On Aug 21, 2012, at 18:28, Adam Bridge <abridge at mac.com> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> Amazon has announced "Glacier" as a long-term storage / infrequent
>> retrieval service. It would seem perfect for those who wish to have a
>> completely separate backup for their important image libraries.
>>>>> 
>>>>> You can read about it here:
>>>>> 
>>>>> <http://aws.amazon.com/glacier/>
>>>>> 
>>>>> This is NOT for ready on-line storage. You might have to wait 5 hours
>> to get your data. But it looks reasonably affordable.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Adam Bridge
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> Leica Users Group.
>>>>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> Leica Users Group.
>>>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>>> 
>>> 
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Leica Users Group.
>>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>>> 
>> 
>> 
>> _______________________________________________
>> Leica Users Group.
>> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
>> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
> See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information
> 



Replies: Reply from billcpearce at cox.net (Bill Pearce) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)
In reply to: Message from abridge at mac.com (Adam Bridge) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)
Message from spencer at aotera.org (Spencer Cheng) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)
Message from abridge at mac.com (Adam Bridge) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)
Message from spencer at aotera.org (Spencer Cheng) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)
Message from jayanand at gmail.com (Jayanand Govindaraj) ([Leica] Amazon's long-term storage)