…or maybe everything.
Add value.
Educate or entertain, but seek to always add value.
Staggered FTP backups on the PC
After a disaster or two, I wanted a backup of my web server. I have a VPS account with lots of domains, most have at least one database. I also wanted staggered, incremental backups going back a week, so I have 7 days to restore anything.
My web host, Wiredtree, who I love, offer a service to zip up my whole server, databases and all, once a day. So I signed up, but it overwrites the backup everyday. So I could never restore from more than a day ago.
After much searching, here’s the best solution I could come up with. It’s clunky, and not free, but it works.
I tried every FTP client on the web that offers scheduling I could find. Finally I settled on < href="http://www.coreftp.com/" target="_blank">Core FTP. Their site is terrible, and it’s indicative of the application’s design. But for $40, you get a pretty solid FTP client, that works well.
I found a tutorial on how to schedule downloads here:
http://www.coreftp.com/docs/web1/Schedule_FTP_transfers.htm but it’s not the most clear.
What you’re doing it connection to you server, and browsing to where your backups up. Then locally, move to where you want your backups to end up. Highlight all the files on the server as though you were going to download them. But instead, right click and select “Queue”. Why, I’ve no idea.
Then in the Queue in the bottom panel, highlight them all again, right click, and select “schedule”. You are, in effect, scheduling this queue to run.
The next hiccup, is to “Add task” on the next screen without trying to set the times it will run. Once you’ve saved it, and it appears in the top panel, now click on it. It will populate the bottom again, and now you can click on “Freq|Details” to schedule. Don’t forget to put in your password!
I created seven folders on my local machine, Sunday though Saturday, and went thru this process seven times. Each time I changed the local folder, and which day it would run on. Clunky, and annoying, but it works. Everyday one scheduled queue downloads my backups to the matching day on my local machine. I now have seven days of backups.
How do you do it? Is there something better? There must be!
Getting professional headshots
Last fall I got turned on to Living Social. It offers deals from local business, and I’ve since had my house cleaned, gotten a massage, and eaten at a few amazing restaurants I’d never heard of. In December I saw a deal for a one hour professional photo shoot. Normally $300, I’d only have to spend $80 to walk away with a disk full of professional photos. I jumped on it.
Why would you get professional headshots? No matter what you do, if you are trying to do it professionally, you are a brand. Brands these days need a face, and that’s you. It’s kind of like how companies use logos. You want something compelling, memorable and friendly (most of the time).
That snapshot of you giving a thumbs up from Facebook is okay, but if you want to look professional, people need to literally see you that way. You don’t often see a birthday polaroid on album covers, in theater bills or on the cover of magazines. You a see professional photo.
And anyway, ever new site or app you sign up for asks for a photo for your profile. Who wouldn’t want a slick-looking photo to represent themselves?
I was there for about an hour, had around 70 photos taken of my goofing around, on both black and white backgrounds. That way when I got the photos back, I could crop out the background and put myself anywhere. Grand canyon backdrop, anyone?
The other thing I did right was really think about how I was going to use the photos. So I chose a few different poses and “attitudes” so I was sure to get photos I could use. Some will be resume or speaking-on-a-panel fodder. Some will be profile pics, and some will end up on various more fun projects.
I wore a suit but didn’t bring a change of clothes, and I think that was my biggest mistake. I look like a pastor, and I have 70 shots of me looking like a pastor. A few are simple enough that serve my purpose, and a couple are goofy enough I can re-purpose them.
The experience was great, and I no longer hem and haw about what photo to use when asked for one. Take yourself seriously, and go get some professional photos taken.