Docsity
Docsity

Prepare for your exams
Prepare for your exams

Study with the several resources on Docsity


Earn points to download
Earn points to download

Earn points by helping other students or get them with a premium plan


Guidelines and tips
Guidelines and tips

Protecting Your Data: A Study Guide for Ag and Business Management Students, Study notes of Agricultural engineering

This study guide from morgan community college provides insights and practical steps for ag and business management students to protect their financial analysis information. Topics include creating backup copies, safeguarding against viruses, and preventing human and logical errors. Learn the importance of test restores and the essential role of backups in mitigating potential data loss.

Typology: Study notes

Pre 2010

Uploaded on 08/18/2009

koofers-user-9kl
koofers-user-9kl 🇺🇸

10 documents

1 / 2

Toggle sidebar

This page cannot be seen from the preview

Don't miss anything!

bg1
Morgan Community College – Ag and Business Management
File: Study Guide – Protecting Your Data 1
Study Guide
Protecting Your Data
Introduction
This study guide is intended to give you ideas and experience in protecting your
financial analysis information. Protecting information includes making backup copies of
your data, providing safeguards against viruses, worms, and unauthorized access to your
data.
Overview
One of the most exasperating things about computers is that as a technology they
are still way more unreliable than a lot of other technological wonders that we take for
granted. One of the ways that we are troubled by computers is that we occasionally lose
information to either hardware failure, mistakes in using the computer, or by
unknowingly allowing viruses to invade our computers.
The suggestions in this study guide will help you reduce the chances of data loss
in the following ways: by showing you how to create backup copies of your data; by
taking your through a step-by-step process of doing a test restore to prove that the backup
copy will work if needed; and by explaining some of the terminology and behaviors that
are common to the group of programs collectively called viruses or worms. We will work
through a checklist that will help you gauge your risk of data loss. We will also explore
some of the more common methods to back up your data and look at ways of restricting
others’ access to your data.
Not If, but When
If you use computers for useful things, you will experience some data loss. The
degree of data loss may be very minor, such as the electricity going off while entering a
transaction, resulting in you having to re-enter that transaction once you get the computer
running again. At the other extreme, you may have your entire computer destroyed by
fire or other catastrophic event. Other events can leave your computer in working
condition, but leaves you unable to access your data.
Types of Potential Data Loss
When you are missing data it doesn’t much matter what sort of data loss it is.
But, it does make a difference when you are looking at strategies for safeguarding the
information. Here is a list of three types of data loss and brief suggestions to prevent
them.
Human Error- This type of data loss is basically an error on the part of the user.
The computer is working fine; the operator has made some sort of mistake such as
accidentally deleting a file. Or they changed and saved a file they now wish they
hadn’t. Suggestions include: routine and systematic backup of the data; don’t be too
tidy with the recycle bin (you may be able to retrieve a deleted file from it); Saving
files under a new name before beginning to modify them.
pf2

Partial preview of the text

Download Protecting Your Data: A Study Guide for Ag and Business Management Students and more Study notes Agricultural engineering in PDF only on Docsity!

Morgan Community College – Ag and Business Management

File: Study Guide – Protecting Your Data 1

Study Guide

Protecting Your Data

Introduction This study guide is intended to give you ideas and experience in protecting your financial analysis information. Protecting information includes making backup copies of your data, providing safeguards against viruses, worms, and unauthorized access to your data.

Overview One of the most exasperating things about computers is that as a technology they are still way more unreliable than a lot of other technological wonders that we take for granted. One of the ways that we are troubled by computers is that we occasionally lose information to either hardware failure, mistakes in using the computer, or by unknowingly allowing viruses to invade our computers.

The suggestions in this study guide will help you reduce the chances of data loss in the following ways: by showing you how to create backup copies of your data; by taking your through a step-by-step process of doing a test restore to prove that the backup copy will work if needed; and by explaining some of the terminology and behaviors that are common to the group of programs collectively called viruses or worms. We will work through a checklist that will help you gauge your risk of data loss. We will also explore some of the more common methods to back up your data and look at ways of restricting others’ access to your data.

Not If, but When If you use computers for useful things, you will experience some data loss. The degree of data loss may be very minor, such as the electricity going off while entering a transaction, resulting in you having to re-enter that transaction once you get the computer running again. At the other extreme, you may have your entire computer destroyed by fire or other catastrophic event. Other events can leave your computer in working condition, but leaves you unable to access your data.

Types of Potential Data Loss When you are missing data it doesn’t much matter what sort of data loss it is. But, it does make a difference when you are looking at strategies for safeguarding the information. Here is a list of three types of data loss and brief suggestions to prevent them.

  • Human Error- This type of data loss is basically an error on the part of the user. The computer is working fine; the operator has made some sort of mistake such as accidentally deleting a file. Or they changed and saved a file they now wish they hadn’t. Suggestions include: routine and systematic backup of the data; don’t be too tidy with the recycle bin (you may be able to retrieve a deleted file from it); Saving files under a new name before beginning to modify them.

Morgan Community College – Ag and Business Management

File: Study Guide – Protecting Your Data 2

  • Logical Error -The computer’s operating system has encountered an error. Generally, the more programs you have loaded on your computer, and the more programs you have running, the greater the likelihood that the computer will have trouble with the file system. Suggestions: Routine, systematic backups; emptying the recycle bin; running Disk Cleanup followed by Disk Defragmenter all will make the file system as simple as possible for the operating system. The less complicated the file system is, the less chance there is of logical error.
  • Physical Damage -The computer’s hardware is somehow damaged. This could include hard disk failure or something as severe as the destruction of the computer by fire, flood, etc. Suggestions: Routine, systematic backups; off-site storage of backups; multiple backups so that the existing backup is not destroyed while making the new backup.

Backups are Essential The only way you can really prevent potential data loss is to make a backup of the information that it can be retrieved if the original information is lost. Depending on how much you use the computer the backup can be doing a File => Save As and saving the file you are working on to a floppy disk. On the other hand, backups can be as complicated as doing a backup of all the files on the computer that have been changed since the last backup.

Test Restores are Essential Too! Making routine, systematic backups can give a person a false sense of security. In at least one case we can think of, a backup that should have worked was not able to be accessed when it was really needed. Making a test restore is essential to prove that the hardware and software is capable of restoring the backup.

In Conclusion Maintaining the integrity of you data will require a lot of diligence. The first thing is to really consider the work that is done on the computer and have some imagination about what could happen to that data.