"Hey Andrew, what's the best way to transfer these files from my old 
laptop to my new one? Use a couple of CDs?"

"Oh, well why don't you just copy them into a network drive, and then 
copy that back to your new laptop? That'll be a lot easier than messing 
around with CDs."

"Nice idea, but there's some files I'd rather not end up on the network, 
if you know what I mean. I'll just use CDs."

Right. So... rather than store the data temporarily on a busy fileserver 
where it's completely unlikely anybody will be able to recover it in a 
fe weeks' time, you're going to permanently burn it onto CDs, which 
you'll then need to find a way to destroy?

And this is safer because...?

It's almost like that discussion I had the other week with the person 
saying "you don't still use tapes do you? Why don't you use DVDs 
instead?" (Um, gee, because a DVD has about 1/10th the storage capacity?)

I'm also reminded of the story of the user who religiously kept all her 
files on floppy disks so that she wouldn't "fill up" the hard drive in 
her PC. (Which had a capacity of many gigabytes.) Flawless logic - until 
you comprehend the fact that a HD holds many times more data than a 
floppy...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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> Right. So... rather than store the data temporarily on a busy fileserver 
> where it's completely unlikely anybody will be able to recover it in a fe 
> weeks' time, you're going to permanently burn it onto CDs, which you'll 
> then need to find a way to destroy?

I'd use CDs too if I were her, otherwise I wouldn't know who else was 
looking at the files or where they were getting backed up etc.  At least she 
can take the CDs home or burn them or shred them or whatever and be 100% 
sure nobody else has used them.

Anyway, I would be more concerned, as the IT dude, exactly what sort of 
files she doesn't want to have on the network.  Did you remind her that if 
anything happens to her laptop she will then lose those files forever?  And 
that she shouldn't be keeping personal data on company laptops ;-)

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scott wrote:

> I'd use CDs too if I were her, otherwise I wouldn't know who else was 
> looking at the files or where they were getting backed up etc.  At least 
> she can take the CDs home or burn them or shred them or whatever and be 
> 100% sure nobody else has used them.

Mmm, OK.

> Anyway, I would be more concerned, as the IT dude, exactly what sort of 
> files she doesn't want to have on the network.

That *is* a most interesting question, is it not?

> Did you remind her that 
> if anything happens to her laptop she will then lose those files 
> forever?

I would imagine she knows this - but who can tell?

Actually, one time our accountant paid a visit to the USA. When she came 
back, her laptop didn't work any more. When she turned it on, it made a 
noise rather like a coffea grinder. I didn't know a HD could sound like 
that - but apparently it can! :-D

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Invisible wrote:
> "Hey Andrew, what's the best way to transfer these files from my old 
> laptop to my new one? Use a couple of CDs?"
> 
> "Oh, well why don't you just copy them into a network drive, and then 
> copy that back to your new laptop? That'll be a lot easier than messing 
> around with CDs."
> 
> "Nice idea, but there's some files I'd rather not end up on the network, 
> if you know what I mean. I'll just use CDs."
> 


It could be that the files are illegal or could simply get the person 
fired.  The person could simply consider some of the material highly 
personal.


Copying to the network exposes those files outside the computer out of 
the user's control.
Using a CD keeps it in their hands that they can control.
A CD can be destroyed much more quickly and directly than data on a 
network server.  A network server may audit each file that it stores - 
and heaved forbid the file get backed up - out of the user's control.

Call me paranoid, but I have 'rules' that I follow about what 
connections I place between my home and work environments.  If I were in 
his shoes I might come to the same conclusion.


Tom

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Tom Austin wrote:
> Call me paranoid, but I have 'rules' that I follow about what 
> connections I place between my home and work environments.  If I were in 
> his shoes I might come to the same conclusion.

	Is it that hard to simply connect two laptops directly?

-- 
The next war will determine not what is right, but what is left.


                     /\  /\               /\  /
                    /  \/  \ u e e n     /  \/  a w a z
                        >>>>>>mue### [at] nawazorg<<<<<<
                                    anl

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486cbc2b$1@news.povray.org...
> I'm also reminded of the story of the user who religiously kept all her 
> files on floppy disks so that she wouldn't "fill up" the hard drive in her 
> PC. (Which had a capacity of many gigabytes.) Flawless logic - until you 
> comprehend the fact that a HD holds many times more data than a floppy...

Once I had a secretary who never used the HD at all because she had been 
told that hard discs were not reliable.

Everything she wrote was stored in a single Word file kept on a single 
floppy. Every letter was a new page.

G.

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scott wrote:
> I'd use CDs too if I were her, otherwise I wouldn't know who else was 
> looking at the files or where they were getting backed up etc.

I would have recommended a USB memory stick, myself.

> Anyway, I would be more concerned, as the IT dude, exactly what sort of 
> files she doesn't want to have on the network.  

Is there anyone here who *doesn't* think it's porn?


-- 
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
  Helpful housekeeping hints:
   Check your feather pillows for holes
    before putting them in the washing machine.

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Invisible wrote:
> you comprehend the fact that a HD holds many times more data than a 
> floppy...

I had an amusing thought the other day. If you had an entire Apple ][ 
for every byte of memory an Apple ][ could address, you could fit all 
the memory of all those machines on one DVD.

You can't even buy a hard drive that won't hold five Commodore Pet 
computers worth of memory for every *bit* of memory a Commodore Pet 
could address.

-- 
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)
  Helpful housekeeping hints:
   Check your feather pillows for holes
    before putting them in the washing machine.

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>> I'd use CDs too if I were her, otherwise I wouldn't know who else was 
>> looking at the files or where they were getting backed up etc.
> 
> I would have recommended a USB memory stick, myself.

That only works if you *have* a USB stick. :-P

>> Anyway, I would be more concerned, as the IT dude, exactly what sort 
>> of files she doesn't want to have on the network.  
> 
> Is there anyone here who *doesn't* think it's porn?

Far more likely to be pictures of her baby girl paddling on the beach.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Gilles Tran wrote:

> Once I had a secretary who never used the HD at all because she had been 
> told that hard discs were not reliable.

Oh, the irony!

HDs were once of questionably reliability, but floppies are so 
hopelessly unreliable it's not even worth thinking about!

> Everything she wrote was stored in a single Word file kept on a single 
> floppy. Every letter was a new page.

Wow.

That's really special.

I mean, forget for a moment the fact that editing a Word document stored 
on a floppy is 97% guaranteed to result in file corruption... A new 
document for each page?

I'm... stunned.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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