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“iCloud Backup”

marco.org

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Re: “iCloud Backup”

#61

Post by karpathy »

I have a flipped perspective of this. In my experience, Apple tries to be too clever and does many unintuitive things behind the scenes so that "it just works".

I went through a horror scenario that scared me when I bought a new iPhone and my old pictures and videos for some reason did not sync over to the new device. I thought for a few brief moments that I lost 2 years worth of pictures and videos and that was enough to scar me permanently.

I now periodically back up all my pictures/videos from my iPhone and iPad to a folder in my Dropbox. Seeing all the files listed out in my folders gives me comfort, because I know there's no attempts at cleverness going haywire in the background, erasing and moving things around when I click "yes" or "no" to some popup question that I don't fully understand.

So I'm not sure what the right answer is. Sometimes I wish it wasn't as much magical as completely transparent about what's happening. Maybe there could be some nice UI that shows exactly what is stored, and people could somehow drag and drop data between devices?

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#62

Post by Angostura »

dm3 wrote: post #42
guelo wrote: post #8

The whole iDevice ecosystem is complicated. I've seen even tech savvy people suffer data loss or prolonged inconvenience. A lot of it is caused by bad design and buggy software, but a lot of it is also caused by Apple arrogantly throwing up intentional roadblocks.

I consider myself technical, but when recently faced with a task of backing up contacts from an iPad to iCloud - I got scared. The iPad had an iCloud account set up. It was unrelated to the current device's owner, so I couldn't back the device up to that account. There is a 'Remove account' button, but what's going to happen when I remove the account? Is something going to disappear from the iPad? How am I going to k…

Similarly, I consider myself technical but the whole iCloud syncing business on iOS and OS X Lion (may have improved in ML) is a mess and I managed to lose documents. Syncing has to be turned on and off in multiple places with non-intuitive descriptions of what may happen.

Turning syncing off warns that data will be lost (huh? I don't want you to delete anything, just stop syncing the two data sets).

Tis all a muddle.

And then backup. You have to choose between backing up to this computer and backing up to iCloud? Why? I certainly don't trust iCloud with my only backup, but having it as a remote adjunct would be handy. Why can't I back up to both?

It's horrible.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#63

Post by Ntrails »

kylec wrote: post #20

Last friday a co-worker managed to snag one of the new iPhone 5s from an AT&T store and wanted to transfer everything from his old iPhone 3GS to it. He had not been syncing his 3GS to any computer, so I thought it would be a simple matter to set it up to sync with iTunes on his work computer, have it make a backup, then restore that backup onto the iPhone 5. Unfortunately, this is not as easy as it should be. The syn…

"Why can't Apple be smarter and have iTunes download all information from the iPhone upon connection?"

I would imagine this is because the iPhone/Pod/Pad is expected to be a slave not a master.

When I hook my iPhone up to someone else's computer, it asks me if I want to overwrite everything on the phone with that data, not upload my data over theirs. Indeed, with purchased data going up from a phone the computer should need to be authorised etc first.

Whilst I accept that what you wanted to do should be simpler and more intuitive - I would be very unhappy were it automatic.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#64

Post by pmuk »

I've just upgraded from an iPhone 4S to an iPhone 5 using iCloud backup. I assumed it could do everything that an iTunes based backup could do, but I was wrong. It didn't backup any of my audiobooks - so I have to buy those again, and it wiped all my Google Authenticator codes.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#65

Post by eckyptang »

primigenus wrote: post #49

This is why I'm so infatuated with the concept of the Chromebook. A lot of the "techie" stuff like backups and restoring that Marco describes here is solved with a Chromebook. And it uses familiar user interface paradigms that people recognise from their experience using Windows (especially now that they added the windows management system that looks a lot like Windows 7), whereas the iPad has completely new paradigm…

ChomeBook wouldn't work even in the suburbs of London, UK. We have frequent mobile network and Internet outages.

If you need to rely on the device, sorry but it's local apps + synchronisation or bust.

Centralised computing works fine if your kit is in the office and your clients are in the office and your operations team are shit hot. Otherwise - it's totally retarded.

Some of our corporate clients even have a direct fiber connection to us as they don't trust the Internet not to screw up.

This is reality.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#66

Post by eckyptang »

nsp wrote: post #18
eli wrote: post #4

I have to assume the genius was off script. The shop I worked at had people sign a document before authorizing anything destructive. We usually imaged the disk anyway. Definitely agree with the larger point though. PCs (phones, tablets, etc) are ridiculously hard to use and unreliable even if you kinda sorta know what you're doing.

I worked at the Apple 5th avenue retail store until April, and there is a document that has to be signed acknowledging that you could lose all your data. That said, it's usually framed as a "this probably won't happen, but just in case"

I'd tell them to piss of if they asked that. It's their job to fix it without losing your data.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#67

Post by bad_user »

UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #59
primigenus wrote: post #49

This is why I'm so infatuated with the concept of the Chromebook. A lot of the "techie" stuff like backups and restoring that Marco describes here is solved with a Chromebook. And it uses familiar user interface paradigms that people recognise from their experience using Windows (especially now that they added the windows management system that looks a lot like Windows 7), whereas the iPad has completely new paradigm…

I love the concept of a Chromebook; however the Chromebook is based on an assumption: that we are always connected. 24/7/365, and unfortunately I haven't found that to be the case. Once that is the case: that I can get an internet connection from dawn until dusk, no matter where in the country I travel, or heck even what country I travel to then I would absolutely get a Chromebook. But we aren't there yet.

Being online all the time is not something insurmountable. My mobile plan came with data included. I have 3G connectivity all the time, for really good prices too, both on my phone and on my iPad and I live in Romania, not the U.S. or some other country that's in the top countries when it comes to Internet connectivity.

And I'm seeing people living in the country-side, on farms, talking through Skype to their relatives that live abroad, using an USB stick that's connecting them through 3G, or using a broadband 50-100 Mbps connection exposed through Wifi. It's totally shocking, given that some of those places do not have access to cable TV (only through satellite) or to basic utilities such as marsh gas pipes, yet they have Internet access.

Of course, right now Internet access is a problem, even for us sometimes. The costs of my 3G connection is enormous when in roaming. Sometimes you lack the signal and 3G connectivity is not available everywhere, etc... but in 5 years from now I believe it will be a non-issue.

And Chromebook is designed for the long-run and I hope they won't cancel it in the wake of Android's success.

There are Chrome apps that are designed to also have functionality when offline, albeit limited. For instance there is a GMail app in the Chrome store that's designed to work in offline mode [1]. It's really basic and not something I would use, being more like a demo at this time.

I was also sad to hear that Google Reader is not working in offline mode anymore, so now for my iPad I'm searching for a replacement, and because what I've found in the store seems to suck, I may even code one myself - although I may just forward new items to my email address and do some filtering in my email client.

[1] https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ejidjjhkpiempkbhmp...

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#68

Post by Adirael »

karpathy wrote: post #61

I have a flipped perspective of this. In my experience, Apple tries to be too clever and does many unintuitive things behind the scenes so that "it just works". I went through a horror scenario that scared me when I bought a new iPhone and my old pictures and videos for some reason did not sync over to the new device. I thought for a few brief moments that I lost 2 years worth of pictures and videos and that was enou…

You can use the Dropbox App to do that for you, it will sync your media with your Dropbox automatically.

I think in this sync issue DRM is at fault. Sync between old iPods and iTunes worked that way because music was DRM'ed and they didn't want you to give your friend your 40GB iPod and let him copy all your music. It has been carried away too long, there should be two way sync.

This is a special pain in the ass when you have more than one Mac.

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#69

Post by thetinguy »

kylec wrote: post #20

Last friday a co-worker managed to snag one of the new iPhone 5s from an AT&T store and wanted to transfer everything from his old iPhone 3GS to it. He had not been syncing his 3GS to any computer, so I thought it would be a simple matter to set it up to sync with iTunes on his work computer, have it make a backup, then restore that backup onto the iPhone 5. Unfortunately, this is not as easy as it should be. The syn…

fyi the correct procedure is to plug in old device transfer purchases back up device plug in device restore from backup

iOS: Transferring information from your current iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch to a new device http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2109

Re: “iCloud Backup”

#70

Post by _kkcr »

bad_user wrote: post #67
UnoriginalGuy wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love the concept of a Chromebook; however the Chromebook is based on an assumption: that we are always connected. 24/7/365, and unfortunately I haven't found that to be the case. Once that is the case: that I can get an internet connection from dawn until dusk, no matter where in the country I travel, or heck even what country I travel to then I would absolutely get a Chromebook. But we aren't there yet.

Being online all the time is not something insurmountable. My mobile plan came with data included. I have 3G connectivity all the time, for really good prices too, both on my phone and on my iPad and I live in Romania, not the U.S. or some other country that's in the top countries when it comes to Internet connectivity. And I'm seeing people living in the country-side, on farms, talking through Skype to their relativ…

There's no reasonably priced option when you're abroad (even within Europe), that I'm aware of.
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