U.K. Web Host Accidentally Deletes Web Sites

[engine]

All the more reason to make sure your web sites are backup up frequently.

When did you last backup your sites?

The company, which hosts 1.7m sites in the UK, said an error made during maintenance "effectively deleted" what was on some of its servers.

"We can conclude that the issues faced have resulted in some data loss for some customers," the firm admitted. U.K. Web Host Accidentally Deletes Web Sites [bbc.co.uk]

[Andy Langton]

Apparently, was a "viral marketing" hoax:

[meta.serverfault.com...]

Earlier thread here:

[webmasterworld.com...]

[engine]

Viral marketing hoax? According to the information on the host's site it talks about the outage.

[Andy Langton]

Oops, I was thinking it referred to the earlier occurrence - this one looks like the real deal!

[piatkow]

I had missed the report and thought it was a duplication of the previous thread as well.

That situation should only be a problem if you are using an on-line editor but I have seen plenty of posts in support forums from people who don't keep their files after uploading.

[lucy24]

When did you last backup your sites?

It's easy when you're small. Everything that's on the website-- and lots of stuff that isn't any longer*-- is also on my personal hard drive.

:: hasty Edit here to delete editorial comment from cat on keyboard, oops ::

So is every ebook I've ever uploaded to a third-party site.

Of course if I were really good I'd do like one ebook creator I know, who keeps backups of everything forever in a completely separate location.


* Saved under highly scientific names like "fontlinks OLD", "fontlinks OLDER", "fontlinks REALLY, REALLY OLD" and so on.

[graeme_p]

For anything that matters, you should be using version control for code and static files, and automated backups for content that is managed through a CMS.

[engine]

I found someone that has been affected: They are none too pleased, of course. They have restored their own data thanks to their own backups.