Offsite Backups For Your FFXI Customizations

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Offsite backups for your FFXI customizations
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By Felgarr 2019-07-09 14:25:27  
Hi folks,
I wanted to share a method for offsite backups I use every day that can be used to back up any file or folder on your computer. I use it to backup my entire Ashita (or Windower) folder, ashitacast XML (gearswap) files, code, spreadsheets, etc. etc.

1.) I use Dropbox and pay $120/year for 2TB of storage. (I also use this for photos/videos from my phone, etc.

2.) Dropbox will synchronize files/folders to/from your machine or whatever device has Dropbox installed and signed into your account. (You can enable selective sync to choose what folders get synchronized to/from your machine.

Pre-requisite Info
Dropbox syncs any files/folders underneath it. However, your important files can be installed anywhere on your computer. The way to get around this is to create a junction. A junction is a hard-linked folder that all point to the same location on your hard disk.

Example folders you may want to backup:
C:\Windower
C:\Ashita
C:\Program Files (x86)\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XI\USER (This is all of your characters' macros, markers and settings)

Let's assume Dropbox is installed and you're logged in to your Dropbox account. Let's say your Dropbox folder is: C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox. To start the syncing process, you'll need to open a command prompt:

Start
1.) Open up your command prompt, by Start->Run, type cmd and right-click "Run as Administrator"

2.) Run the following commands, but change to match your folders:

```
cd C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox
mkdir Junctions
mklink /j C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox\Junctions\Windower C:\Windower
mklink /j C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox\Junctions\Ashita C:\Ashita
mklink /j C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox\Junctions\USER "C:\Program Files (x86)\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XI\USER"
```

And that's it! Dropbox will treat the Junctions folders and as part of their directory tree and sync everything underneath. You can log into Dropbox and choose Selective-Sync to deselect folders you don't want to backup to the cloud.

TLDR: The mklink command can be used with Dropbox to backup any folder/file in near real-time.

I'd like to hear thoughts, feedback, questions and perhaps your own backup strategies.

Edit: Fixed typo, thanks Sabertiger.
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 Bismarck.Sabertiger
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サーバ: Bismarck
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By Bismarck.Sabertiger 2019-07-09 18:03:31  
This is actually a really good and relatively simple strategy that most people can probably work with.

However, I believe your commands are a bit off.
These two are fine,
cd C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox
mkdir Junctions

But then you should cd into the new Junctions folder, so:
cd Junctions
(you shouldn't need the full path here as you are already in the \Dropbox folder)

But once you start making the junctions, the commands listed will actually error out because the folders already exist in the first part of the command (see bolded section below)
mklink /j C:\Windower C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox\Junctions\Windower

That first path should actually just be the name of the junction, so in this case, Windower, not the full path to the windower folder.

Second, this part
mklink /j C:\Windower C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox\Junctions\Windower should actually be the path to your windower folder, so your command looks like this:

mklink /j Windower C:\Windower

Keeping in mind that you should be creating this junction inside the C:\users\YourUsernameHere\Dropbox\Junctions folder. The idea is for the Dropbox\Junctions folder to contain pointers that point back to your important data to be backed up.

So, TL;DR, adjust commands like this:
cd C:\Users\Felgar\Dropbox
mkdir Junctions
cd Junctions
mklink /j Windower C:\Windower
mklink /j Ashita C:\Ashita
mklink /j User "C:\Program Files (x86)\PlayOnline\SquareEnix\FINAL FANTASY XI\USER"

OP has the right idea here people, BACK YOUR STUFF UP!
 Asura.Chaostaru
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By Asura.Chaostaru 2019-07-09 18:24:33  
I just always zip my windower folder and throw it in dropbox manually once every 2 weeks as a habit. takes like 2seconds.
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By Felgarr 2019-07-09 19:14:24  
Thanks Sabertiger. I fixed the typos you mentioned. I always forget the order of source/target when it comes to copy/symlink/hardlink or any commands that work with folders.

Also, I make a habit of typing out full directory paths or when writing them in a script. This is just to prevent accidents. It's silly, but it's a habit that has kept me employed as a sysadmin and then software engineer for years.
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By Felgarr 2019-07-09 19:16:58  
Asura.Chaostaru said: »
I just always zip my windower folder and throw it in dropbox manually once every 2 weeks as a habit. takes like 2seconds.

This works, but my method in the OP, will upload the file to dropbox everytime it changes. If you change a file and save it, it gets uploaded to dropbox immediately.
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By Draylo 2019-07-09 19:46:34  
Is dropbox good? I was looking into cloud services since my phone got stolen a few months ago, to back up my pics. I subbed to onedrive but the upload speeds are terrible.
 Bismarck.Sabertiger
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By Bismarck.Sabertiger 2019-07-09 20:27:55  
Felgarr said: »
Thanks Sabertiger. I fixed the typos you mentioned. I always forget the order of source/target when it comes to copy/symlink/hardlink or any commands that work with folders.

Also, I make a habit of typing out full directory paths or when writing them in a script. This is just to prevent accidents. It's silly, but it's a habit that has kept me employed as a sysadmin and then software engineer for years.

No problem man, I only saw it because I actually use this method myself already! Eh, to each their own for scripting, but if that's the case you don't even need to do a 'cd'. Could just "mkdir C:\users\username\dropbox\junctions" and continue from there. Being a sysadmin myself, I get where you're coming from. Personally I like things shorter for readability, adding comments where needed. Of course, we could just start confusing people and bring variables into the equation... lol
 Bismarck.Sabertiger
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By Bismarck.Sabertiger 2019-07-09 20:35:09  
Draylo said: »
Is dropbox good? I was looking into cloud services since my phone got stolen a few months ago, to back up my pics. I subbed to onedrive but the upload speeds are terrible.

Dropbox is good but almost all of the consumer level "cloud" services have limits on upload speeds. I've actually been using the method described in OP for a while now and it works quite well for backing up the numerous smaller files like config files, etc. associated with windower.

Not sure I would recommend dropbox as a go-to for picture backups. Their free storage space is fairly limited and if you take a lot of pictures it would fill up fast. Honestly, if you have an android phone and a gmail account already, I'd recommend google photos for backing up pictures. If you're an iPhone user you may still be able to use google photos, but iCloud will be your native app and probably has better functionality.
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By Felgarr 2019-07-09 21:55:08  
Forgot to mention this, but yeah I'll probably be switching to google photos for my media backups, but dropbox free tier is fine for the smaller files.
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 Asura.Suteru
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user: Suteru
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By Asura.Suteru 2019-07-10 06:03:17  
If you use Google Drive, you can tell it custom folders to sync.
 Bahamut.Nebohh
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user: Kealohaa
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By Bahamut.Nebohh 2019-07-10 08:01:30  
Also with gmail, you automatically have a google drive and free 15GB. Dropbox is kinda an older cloud storage option. There are other cheaper options as well but whatever works for you. The idea to take away is to back up your stuff on a regular basis.
necroskull Necro Bump Detected! [1407 days between previous and next post]
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By Felgarr 2023-05-17 05:38:14  
Bumping this thread as a reminder to backup for you precious data files, Ashita XML, Lua files, code, screenshots, media, etc.
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necroskull Necro Bump Detected! [217 days between previous and next post]
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By Felgarr 2023-12-20 11:40:16  
PSA: End of year is approaching, please remember to backup your Luas, your macros, your Ashita/Windower folder, your chat logs, your screenshots, your code, and all of the other digital files you care about. :)
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