I have been checking out some of the various on-line backup solutions on the web. Earlier, I wrote a review of Mozy and now I'm looking at Box.net. Box.net is not really a backup program, although it could be used as such. It is a file storage program. Let's look at it's offerings and see how we can use it as a backup program.
First off, if you are looking for an automated backup solutions, this is not the service for you. Check out Mozy Remote Backup instead. Now, let's look at what it will do for you.
Let's say you have a big file, or a lot of files, that you need to share with your group. Now, if you have a web space big enough, you could send them there, but this is hard to manage, unless you have the right software installed. You could email the files to the group, but for a lot of files or large files this might not work. Most email programs limit the size of attachments and sending several files is a big pain.
Collaboration is also more difficult through email or a web site. If I send the file to John, Paul, George and Ringo. Ringo then makes a change and he has to then email it to everyone for us all to see the changes. Revisions are hard to keep track of and it is easy for someone to use an older version by mistake. What a pain.
A file storage site, such as Box.net is a great alternative. You can create a link so that everyone can view the file. You can also password protect the file. You can do this for an entire folder too, so that you can put all your pictures you took of the freak hail storm this spring in one folder and make it available to the world. The password protection is not available with the free version though (which I used for testing).
Collaboration is very important if you are working on a group project. Being able to have all the files in one location, clearly organized, is very important. Setting up a file store and adding collaborators means that everyone who is collaborating with you can update the files, upload new ones, and you will be able to see it as soon as they update.
Box.net also allows collaboration with various other services, such as eFax, Zazzle, Blogger, Facebook, Gmail, Twitter and many others. They have several price points, ranging from free for 1gb of space to $19.95/month for 15gb. They also have an Enterprise edition that is $15/user.
There are two things I'd like to see that are missing:
1. Check in/check out so that a file can be checked out so no-one else can alter it while you are working on it.
2. Automatically replicate between the files there and the files on your PC. This way, you can update a file locally and it will be uploaded to the file storage service. Also when someone else updates, your local copy would automatically be updated.