The Doug Reeve?s Universe

Ironflight · #1 11-03-2010, 10:25 AM

?Life, the Universe, and Everything!? (The answer is ?42?)

Isn?t technology amazing? Here we were, ?Mikey? and I , up at Northwest Regional Airport to get his prop balanced, and Doug was hanging around to take a few pictures. At one point, we needed a knife to cut a cable tie, and Doug whips out his Swiss Army Knife, complete with a 16 Gig flash drive. OK, so lots of folks have those these days?right? But what?s special about this one, the one Doug is showing in the picture? The ENTIRE Vans Airforce universe is backed up on that knife!! The web site, the forums, the archives ? EVERYTHING!! Heck, he?s probably got the entitre NOS library there as well?.

I frequently use the GPS as an example of the phrase ?any significantly advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic? when I talk with folks about how complex our society has become. But I think I?m going to start to use flash drives as well?.

Paul

harrisonaero · #2 11-03-2010, 12:28 PM

If you believe the technology magazines you'll read that compared to the natural world, our technology has progressed to the stage of a bug.

And if you believe Rutan (at least the talk I heard him give at Oshkosh) you'll hear that historically transportation technology has made leaps of 10X. From a daily radius of travel of 5 miles with the horse, to 50 miles with the car, to 500 miles with the airplane.

We're just getting started folks... and it's an exciting time to make it happen

DeltaRomeo · #3 11-03-2010, 12:36 PM

Paul,
Here is a link to the place where I got my backup solution:
http://www.swissarmy.com/multitools/Pages/Category.aspx?category=victorinox+flash&

In addition to the backups of my Outlook email stuff, the entire VAF website and my accounting software?.the knife contains a copy of ?Virtual Clone? (http://www.slysoft.com/en/virtual-clonedrive.html ) and ?Virtual CD? (same URL).

You use Virtual CD to burn ?images? of your software CDs (Photoshop, Outlook, Web Authoring stuff, etc) and you use Virtual Clone to fool the computer into believing your pocket knife is actually a CD Rom drive ? useful for reinstalling your software without having to have the actual CD (which is home in the safe).

The theory being I can loose my entire computer, even while away from home, and in a few hours be back up and running on whatever computer I can scrounge up.

Oh, and it contians the PDF manuals for all my avionics?and some music. The manuel for the G3X alone is 298 pages. That and photographs of my software settings pages (Outlook, etc).

And it?s a fingernail file?.

image courtesy swissarmy.com

PS: I also have a 500GB USB drive attached to the computer with a copy of everthing, so I guess the knife is a 'copy of a copy' <g>.
PSS: Yes, the truly sensitive data on the flash drive is wrapped in its own encrypted volume (using this free software).

JDRhodes · #4 11-03-2010, 12:43 PM

I wash a pocketknife in my pants about once a week. May not be the best option for me.

mike newall · #5 11-03-2010, 01:35 PM

No..........

What he has in his pants is The Light Of Zartha !

We are not safe while it is on our planet..........

N8RV · #6 11-03-2010, 01:40 PM

I never thought of myself as a pocketknife-wielding redneck, but when I graduated from college, my wife's boss gave me a tiny red Swiss army knife.

I can probably count on one hand the number of days since that I've been without one (and, yes, I've sent a few through the washer, too).

And now, with a 16GB flash drive and a flashlight or laser. Wow ...

The only problem is that I don't think I have that much junk on any computer worth saving.

Jamie · #7 11-03-2010, 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JDRhodes

I wash a pocketknife in my pants about once a week. May not be the best option for me.

As a data point I have an old 512MB flash drive that's been washed no fewer than 10 times. It still works fine. :-) Maybe I've just been lucky.

The only problem with keeping data on a flash drive is if it's lost or stolen. Don't put anything sensitive on there (i.e. passwords, tax returns, etc) unless you have it encrypted. Easiest way to do it for most Windows users is to use Truecrypt which is completely free. I choose to encrypt all of my sensitive files on my flash drives with GnuPG. Both solutions use AES256 encryption which is pretty much considered "military grade" and uncrackable my mere mortals.

As far as the Swiss Army Knife USB drive...uh...that's just awesome.

David Z · #8 11-03-2010, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jamie

The only problem with keeping data on a flash drive is if it's lost or stolen.

Couldn't agree more. I've lost track of the number of times I have walked up to a computer in a library and found somebody else's USB key.

dmaib · #9 11-03-2010, 03:32 PM

I've lost track of the number of small swiss army knives I've had to donate to the TSA back when I rode on airlines more frequently.

Since my air travel has become just about exclusively RV, I have managed to keep the one I have now for over two years!

islandmonkey · #10 11-03-2010, 04:11 PM

So here am I, sitting in the land that invented the device that has the encrypted back up of the backup of the VAF Universe. I am going out tomorrow and I am going to buy two, so I can cluster them!

Doug has managed to shrink the known universe into the VAF Universe. I know this because I have just spoken to Ed D'Arcy who is sitting at this moment in the BVI with all his family and they will celebrate Ed's fathers 92nd birthday tomorrow.

Happy Birthay Mr D'Arcy senior from Switzerland.

Ed, keep the mystery photos coming, I love them.

RV-4 build will soon be under way.