Re: Correction to ZIP: Mass Removal of Archive Bit on All Directories

["J. R. Fox" jr_fox@xxxxxxxxxx]

Patricia M Godfrey wrote:

> I gather that with OS/2, one can back up one's
> system files. Lucky OS/2 users.

Patricia,

I'm not sure about that, either way. But our version of XCOPY is more
capable.

> But the whole point about Windows is that
> backing it--and Win32-native apps--up is pretty much an exercise in
> futility.

Yes and No. As you may have read in some of my posts, Partition Image
Backup *was* (and maybe still is) the way to go for this. It certainly
worked for me -- using Drive Image, formerly by PowerQuest, now owned
by Symantec -- all the way through my use of NT-4. The landscape seems to
have changed, somewhere into W2K. (For you, running 98SE, this is most
likely _not_ an issue.) There are other imaging products out there. The
imager is supposed to copy not a particular kind of data, but precisely the
1's and 0's, at the bit and sector level. Do that properly, and on Restore,
you *should* have an exact and functional duplication. What will do that
job correctly _now_, in the days of W2K and XP ? -- I'm not sure. (I have
not tried any DI version after 5.0.)

> but sooner or later you're going to HAVE to reinstall the
> whole ruddy thing. It morphs.

If one had a periodic, restorable, baseline replica of the OS and app.s, one
would lose *far* less, in the way of time and effort, to get back to the
status
quo ante. The last viable image might not be up to date, but it would be far

more appealing than starting over from scratch, and it would work. This
_was_
the case for me, for a long time, though for whatever reason(s), what served
me
before no longer does.

> Yes, I know there are various utils that will "backup" Windows and
> applications. But they all use some kind of nonnative format and require
> that you reinstall, at least to some point, to get them back.

No. While the imaging worked for me, no re-install or partial re-install of
the OS
was necessary. Only making up for whatever had happened -- including any
app.
installs or upgrades -- since the time that image was made.

> Until I can reinstall Windows and its apps with a
> simple command, they way I can XCOPIED DOS apps and data, it's just not
> worth it to me.

I'm simply amazed at the various people who have told me it's no big deal to
re-do
the whole Win boot partition from scratch ! It takes me *weeks*, to get back
to the
level of app. installation and customization that existed before everything
went down
the drain ! One of the most colossal pains in computerdom !

> Especially as Windows really NEEDs that periodic
> reinstall to clean out the detritus it accumulates.

Yeah, eventually, I guess. (If the imaging thing isn't happening for you.)
The OS/2
Registry is laughably simple in comparison, not hard to maintain with the
proper
tools (which don't require that you be a hacker), and the modular, object
oriented
design means that once it is properly set up, you may mess up *something* (in
a way
that's usually very recoverable), but it's awful damn hard to kill the entire
beast. Most
of the users I know have had one version or another running *for years*,
often 24 / 7,
and have *never* needed to reinstall the OS.


Jordan