I'm not a superstitious sort, though I admit to preferring a particular jersey and shorts when I'm racing. But for many people, Friday the 13th [1] is an inauspicious day, long reputed to be unlucky.
So I propose that we fight back against both superstition and the forces of entropy that constantly tear down all those works we labor so hard at creating.
The best defense against entropy is a good backup strategy. To quote a long-ago ad campaign from backup software maker Dantz Development, "To go forward, you must back up."
But as those of us who have had to rely on our backups in the past know, the act of backing up is only the first small step in the full equation - it's being able to restore that really matters.
Some psychiatrist friends with their own practice once ran afoul of this in a serious way. Their bookkeeper had religiously been making backups of all their invoicing and billing records as she worked, but she had never tried restoring from those backups until her hard disk died. When she went to restore from her carefully prepared backups, she was aghast to discover that they hadn't been working. Months of data was lost, and it was a huge problem both for the bookkeeper and for my friends.
Therefore, I humbly submit that Friday the 13th, whenever it rolls around, should be considered International Verify Your Backups Day. (The United Nations is welcome to make this official, and if someone wants to add it to the Wikipedia page linked above, that would undoubtedly help spread the word.) In 2009, Friday the 13th arrives in February, March, and November. If you're reading this article on some other day, I'd encourage you to verify your backups right away and then continue with the Friday the 13th schedule.
Take a few minutes to identify some critical files and see if you can restore them successfully from your backups. If a bootable backup is part of your backup strategy, make sure you can actually boot from it. (If you don't have a good backup from which you can restore right now, allow me to recommend two of our most popular ebooks, Joe Kissell's "Take Control of Mac OS X Backups [2]" or "Take Control of Easy Backups in Leopard [3].")
That's it. No costumes are necessary, there's no obligatory greeting, and you aren't expected to make a special meal. If you feel the need to honor your successful verification, well, a little celebratory imbibing of your favorite beverage is never inappropriate.
But do tell your friends, relatives, and colleagues about International Verify Your Backups Day. Because losing data is not a question of if, but of when, and good backups from which you can restore reliably will protect you from unexpected losses small and large alike.
[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friday_the_13th
[2]: http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/backup-macosx?pt=TB965
[3]: http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/leopard-easy-backup?pt=TB965