🚀 go-pugleaf

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
l

Chuq Von Rospach       -*-      Editor,OtherRealms      -*-      Member SFWA
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