chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (04/03/89)
A while back we had a discussion on Retrospect, Dantz' upcoming archiver
software. They have released a hypercard stack that explains the product,
which I've packaged up and sent to comp.binaries.mac. This also frees me to
talk about the features they've made public (I'm under non-disclosure
because I'm beta testing it, but I can't disclose things that have already
been disclosed).
Basically, Retrospect is a program that lets you build long-term archives of
files. This is different from a backup program like DiskFit, which mirrors
your hard disk to a backup media, in that it doesn't care if the files are
kept around on disk or not. Obvious uses for something like this are
libraries of files that you may want later (public domain libraries, product
development, etc, etc, etc) or archiving files you may need for later
perusal (tax/financial records, for instance).
Among the really nice features of Retrospect are:
o wide range of compatible media, from floppies to WORMS.
o The ability to move an archive from one media to another without
unpacking it and rebuilding it. If you have a floppy library and buy
a tape drive, you can have Retrospect copy the archive over for
you without hassle. (yay!)
o archive compression, using Lempel-Zev. Compression is essentially
as good as StuffIt, but significantly faster.
o archive encryption.
As the betas continue to stabilize, I'm using it for more and more things --
like finally biulding a consolidated archive of those hundreds of floppies I
seem to have accumulated over the years. No more will finding the "Layout
1.7" application be more hassle than it's worth!
chuq
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Chuq Von Rospach -*- Editor,OtherRealms -*- Member SFWA
chuq@apple.com -*- CI$: 73317,635 -*- Delphi: CHUQ -*- Applelink: CHUQ
[This is myself speaking. No company can control my thoughts.]
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computers to spend large amounts of their owners budget on modem charges.jrk@sys.uea.ac.uk (Richard Kennaway) (04/16/89)
Retrospect looks useful, but I had to fight Hypercard to get it to show me the stack that Chuq von Rospach posted recently. I get error messages "Cant understand arguments to command set" at the first card, and a few cards later, "Cant understand what's after if". After which the stack grinds to a halt. I eventually managed to step through all the cards manually...I think. Given the potential mazes the ingenious HyperCard programmer can weave, I dont know if I can be sure I saw it all. Mundane word-processor documents are more readable than any HyperCard stack I've seen (and Theldrow is more fun :-). What is HyperCard actually useful for? -- Richard Kennaway SYS, University of East Anglia, Norwich, U.K. uucp: ...mcvax!ukc!uea-sys!jrk Janet: kennaway@uk.ac.uea.sys
chuq@Apple.COM (Chuq Von Rospach) (04/17/89)
>Retrospect looks useful, but I had to fight Hypercard to get it to show me >the stack that Chuq von Rospach posted recently. I get error messages >"Cant understand arguments to command set" at the first card, and a few >cards later, "Cant understand what's after if". After which the stack >grinds to a halt. Sounds like you're using an older version of Hypercard. That stack requires 1.2 or better. I went back and tried it again here, and had absolutely no problem. Chuq Von Rospach -*- Editor,OtherRealms -*- Member SFWA chuq@apple.com -*- CI$: 73317,635 -*- Delphi: CHUQ -*- Applelink: CHUQ [This is myself speaking. No company can control my thoughts.] USENET: N. A self-replicating phage engineered by the phone company to cause computers to spend large amounts of their owners budget on modem charges.
andyc@inteloa.intel.com (T. Andrew Crump) (04/20/89)
I was curious about Retrospect by Dantz so I called to see
what the price and availablility was. So...
Release Date: May 1989
Price: $249 (whew!)
Will be available thru normal Mac S/W channels.
Hope MacConnection has a good price!
Just thought someone would like to know.
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