Wharton Computing Student Support

PROTECT YOUR WORK

It is always important to take the time to protect yourself from losing your work. Whether at home or in the Wharton computer labs, taking the neccessary steps to protect yourself can prevent you from having to do a project all over again.

Protecting Your Work in the Wharton Computer Labs

If you are using one of the computers in the Wharton computer labs, it is crucial that you practice safe computing habits to backup your work.

• Save Email Attachments Before Editing Them.
  Before working on a document that originated in your email, save your document on the computer's public drive (D:). DO NOT simply open the document from your email and make changes from there, you will lose your changes. Editing documents directly from email does not work. If you want to keep the document in email, you can attach the edited document to a new email once your have finished changing it.
  
  
• Save Your Work.
  You should save your file to one of the two options listed below as you're working:
  
  
  • public drive (D:) folder: This is the place most documents will save by default. You can save any new files to this drive while you are using a public computer. If you save your file to the public drive and you accidentally log off without saving your work elsewhere, your file will probably still be in the public drive when you log back on to that machine. However, after you've logged off you risk having your files deleted during computer maintenance or by other users.
  • MyTempDrive: This virtual drive is a good place to store files temporarily if you need to work on them from different locations on the Wharton Network. This drive is available from any Wharton public workstation, but will not be accessible from home or from other locations at Penn.
    
    
  When you're finished, there are several ways you can take your work with you.
  
  
  • Save your work to a backup device. For information about the different backup devices available and which one would best suit your needs, please see: Backing Up: What Are the Best Solutions For You?
  
  
  • Save your finished file to your storage space on SkyDrive. For instructions on how to do this, refer to the SkyDrive information.
    
    
  Regardless of where you choose to save your file, check to make sure the file is intact at its new destination before deleting the original and logging out.
  
  
• Make Backups Frequently.
  In the unlikely event that your machine freezes, you don't want to lose what you've been working on.

  In addition, machines will automatically reboot at 3am every day, so pay attention to any warning messages about rebooting, and bring a disk to save your work.

• TIP: Don't forget your CD or flash drive when you leave. You might want to label it so it can be identified. If you do forget your disk or drive, you can check with the security desk in JMHH to see if it was turned in.

    

Protecting Your Work at Home

On your personal computer, there are steps you can take to prevent losing documents.

• Backup important documents that are on your computer on a regular basis.

  Don't wait until it is too late to make sure you have copies of any documents that you are storing on your computer. If your computer freezes or crashes, documents on it may not be recoverable.

  For information about the different backup devices available and which one would best suit your needs, please see: Backing Up: What Are the Best Solutions For You?

• Avoid Viruses by updating your anti-virus software and scanning your computer for viruses regularly. For more information on avoiding viruses, see the following document: Avoiding Viruses