Getting started

This section outlines the basic operations required to create and run a backup using DataArmour. The other topics under this section document all of the options available.

The other topics are:

DataArmour perfoms a backup using a number of 'backup items'. Each item specifies some source files and a destination folder. You can configure any number of backup items (limited only by memory and processing power).

Structure your backups any way you like, but normally you would create one backup item for every type of information. For example: You might have five items, named Source code, Documents, Web pages, Misc spreadsheets and Financial. These items would be configured to backup important documents related to the name of the item. (e.g: Web pages would backup all .HTML files and scripts, perhaps graphics as well)

To implement the above scheme, you would create five items with the names above, then create appropriate rules for those items.

How to use the basic features of DataArmour

Even for novice users, DataArmour should be easy to use. The following sections summarise the basic operations:

In general, to perform a backup:

  1. Create an item
  2. Done!. If you did not change the default next execution time, your backup should be running. If you did change the next execution time and you want to run the backup straight away, click on the 'Run item now' button in the toolbar.
  3. If you see a cross beside the item in the list, this means that the item has not been configured to run on this day. Change this using the scheduler options

The backup item will now run according to the schedule you setup on the Schedule tab of the item's option editor. You can force the item to run by selecting it, then clicking the Run item now button on the toolbar (or choosing Run item from the Main menu. View the other topics under this heading for more information, they contain details explanations of all DataArmour functions and operations.

Note: You can perform the edit and delete opterations on multuple items at once by selecting items using either the shift key (to select a list of items) or the ctrl key (to select more than one item at a time).

List views

DataArmour provides a list view for the items, similar to the windows explorer. You can change the view to any one of Large icons, Small icons, List or details. To change the list view mode, use the toolbar buttons.

Window position and style

The size and position of the main window (along with the list view style) is saved when you exit DataArmour. When you restart DataArmour, the window and its style is restored.