jay@umd5.umd.edu (Jay Elvove) (01/29/88)
The conversation regarding FASTBACK PLUS has been very interesting thus
far, so I thought I'd air my first impressions of it as well.
First, the menus are very slick and add lots of backup options that
previous versions of FASTBACK don't have, the nicest of which (to me)
is "automatic" differential and incremental backups. By automatic, I
mean you select one of these as options from a menu. Using an older version
you pretty much have to know which files have changed (perhaps keeping
all modified files in a particular subdirectory) to do these kind of backups.
The speed, using the 'compress data when possible' (or some such) option
seems to be about the same as the earlier version of FASTBACK (5.13) that
I used, once the backup disks have been formatted! I didn't do any actual
timing comparisons, however. Doing a full restore of the data seems quicker.
My "gripes" about FASTBACK PLUS (having been using up to now FASTBACK) are:
1) The RESTORE facility does not have a query/replace option like the
old (FRESTORE) program does. You can restore by a) always overwriting
existing files, b) never overwriting existing files, or c) overwriting
old files. Take your pick.
2) There is no longer a verify-after-the-fact function. FRESTORE (from
earlier levels) allowed you to verify that a file on a disk matched
(or didn't match) a backed up file on diskette.
These two gripes are related: I miss the interactivity of the old FRESTORE
program. Because FASTBACK PLUS now uses a different floppy disk format for
its backups (DOS format, for what it's worth), FRESTORE can no longer be
run on programs backed up with the new product. With all the new flexibility,
I'm surprised that the program's designers decided to remove them.
The $45 upgrade fee seems a fair price, but if you're happy using
FASTBACK now, save your money for a while. Maybe these features will
probably be restored in a later release, if enough PLUS users miss them as
much (and as vocally) as I do. A tech rep at Fifth Generation intimated
as much.
--
Jay Elvove jay@umd5.umd.edu
c/o Systems, Computer Science Center, U. of MD.