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Back That Gmail Up

blog.jerodsanto.net

21–30 of 70 posts

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#21
post #12

I'm not leery of Google shuttering its Gmail service, but I can imagine a scenario where they cut off my access to Gmail and I have no way to plead my case to the search behemoth. I am baffled at how people continue using such a service for something as important as e-mail in 2012, while still being fully aware that their access can be completely cut off at random with no reason or recourse. Does everyone just assume…

I couldn't agree more. Email is essentially the skeleton key to all your other accounts thanks to email reset, even if you use your own domain and don't risk the virtual armageddon of losing both all your mail and your address forever you still risk losing all your mail. Even worse, if your account is hacked you have no effective recourse whatsoever and someone will have access to all your accounts, contacts and email history. I pay for Rackspace mail because when I have a problem, I can call a real phone number and talk to a real human whose interests (company continuing to be paid) are aligned to mine (having a working service).

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#22
post #20
post #12

I'm not leery of Google shuttering its Gmail service, but I can imagine a scenario where they cut off my access to Gmail and I have no way to plead my case to the search behemoth. I am baffled at how people continue using such a service for something as important as e-mail in 2012, while still being fully aware that their access can be completely cut off at random with no reason or recourse. Does everyone just assume…

What is so important about email in 2012? Tell your contacts your new email, and change restore email option at web resources. Sure, it is a bit uncomfortable and will take 1-2 days to finish, but probability of this scenario is very low.

It's also the backdoor to nearly every online account you have, by way of 'reset password' links.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#23
post #12

I'm not leery of Google shuttering its Gmail service, but I can imagine a scenario where they cut off my access to Gmail and I have no way to plead my case to the search behemoth. I am baffled at how people continue using such a service for something as important as e-mail in 2012, while still being fully aware that their access can be completely cut off at random with no reason or recourse. Does everyone just assume…

I think about this, but I find it far more likely that my domain goes bad for one reason or another, or my server crashes than that gmail shuts down my account.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#24
post #12

I'm not leery of Google shuttering its Gmail service, but I can imagine a scenario where they cut off my access to Gmail and I have no way to plead my case to the search behemoth. I am baffled at how people continue using such a service for something as important as e-mail in 2012, while still being fully aware that their access can be completely cut off at random with no reason or recourse. Does everyone just assume…

Shit happens with every provider, free or paid; hoping it won't because you pay $400/month for it is foolish. The smart thing is to make sure it doesn't affect you much, by decoupling from the service and turning it into a replaceable commodity as much as possible. That means using your own domain, keeping backups, etc. Then, when shit happens, you can just sign up for another provider and keep going.

Shit happens, but with nearly every other provider, you can at least talk to someone to find out what happened and get your service restored, or at least get your data.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#25
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just chmod the shell script to 700, so that only your account can read it, together with an encrypted HDD that should be quite save.

If it's a shared box, you'd still have to hide the --pwd argument from `ps` process listings. You'd have to do something like make a ~/.gmail-pass file with the content "--pwd foobar", and call the script like this: cat ~/.gmail-pass | xargs python bagoma.py --email=foo@bar

Good point, hadn't thought of the process list.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#26
post #23
post #12

I'm not leery of Google shuttering its Gmail service, but I can imagine a scenario where they cut off my access to Gmail and I have no way to plead my case to the search behemoth. I am baffled at how people continue using such a service for something as important as e-mail in 2012, while still being fully aware that their access can be completely cut off at random with no reason or recourse. Does everyone just assume…

I think about this, but I find it far more likely that my domain goes bad for one reason or another, or my server crashes than that gmail shuts down my account.

At least you can just change some DNS records and get your mail working on another server. If your gmail account gets suspended there's no way to get that address back, ever.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#28
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I looked through your web site and one question remained unanswered: Does it also do cloud push? In other words, can I use your app to restore the backups to a different Gmail account later?

No, CloudPull does not restore directly back to Google. You could do this independently by restoring to Apple Mail, and then importing into Gmail or another IMAP account.

Two problems with that:

1. I'd rather have one app do the whole thing, so that I know it's tested and it works.

2. How about labels, contact, calendars, etc?

I'd pay for this app, but only if it allowed full roundtrip.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#29
post #26
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think about this, but I find it far more likely that my domain goes bad for one reason or another, or my server crashes than that gmail shuts down my account.

At least you can just change some DNS records and get your mail working on another server. If your gmail account gets suspended there's no way to get that address back, ever.

That's exactly why I use the paid version of Gmail (as a part of Google Apps) with my own domain name.

Re: Back That Gmail Up

#30
post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, CloudPull does not restore directly back to Google. You could do this independently by restoring to Apple Mail, and then importing into Gmail or another IMAP account.

Two problems with that: 1. I'd rather have one app do the whole thing, so that I know it's tested and it works. 2. How about labels, contact, calendars, etc? I'd pay for this app, but only if it allowed full roundtrip.

Sorry, CloudPull has no ability to restore directly to Google. My emphasis has been restoring to local apps. In all cases, there are ways of importing back into Google, but none that the app does on its own.

The ability to restore directly to Google is on my roadmap for future versions.

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