Spanning Backup Backs Up Gmail and Other Google Services - thomasfraidess

At a Glance

Expert's Rating

Pros

A simple, clear, Gmail user interface
Moderately priced

Cons

Confusing interface for Calendar, Contacts, Docs

Our Finding of fact

Spanning Backup is a cloud-based service for backing ascending Google data such as Gmail, Google Contacts, Google Calendar, and more.

When you employ Google services, you trust Google with your most sensitive information: Emails, contacts, calendars–the kit and boodle. What could potentially go wrong? Eastern Samoa it turns out, quite a a bit. Google is not unfailing, and even if it were, users pot make mistakes. Spanning Backup ($3 per calendar month for regular Google accounts users) is a obscure backup servicing that keeps a copy of all of your Google data and lets you doctor it selectively should important data ever go missing.

Spanning Backup UI screenshot — Spanning Computer backup offers a beautiful dashboard showing at a glance how your backups are doing.

Spanning Backup is also available for Google Apps users, at a monetary value of $2.50 per user per month. I proved the service with my paid Google Apps account, and integration couldn't live easier: I simply acknowledged Spanning Backup access to my area, and that was it. I didn't justified have to type in my Google Apps password, or any other password for that matter to.

The selective information Spanning Relief saves is extensive: Gmail, Google Docs, Google Calendar, and Google Contacts, right down to contact images. All information is saved over the cloud, onto Spanning Backup's have servers. You don't get to download whatsoever of it to your own computer, and you can only restore IT to the accounting from which information technology was backed up.

Speaking of restoration, the information restoration user interface leaves a dole out to be desired. To essa Spanning Backup, I deleted a Google contact. When I tried to restore it, Spanning Computer backup presented ME with a list of backup timestamps viewing the dates of recent successful backups. Not paragon, only not to a fault confusing: I clicked the latest successful backup man, taken earlier I deleted the contact. I expected Spanning to show ME contacts deleted Beaver State modified since that backup was ready-made. Instead, it let me pick a contact group to restore–and it wasn't the group the contact I deleted was in. After hunt around the snapshot list for a shot that restrained the group I needed, I over up clicking the earliest snapshot thinking that snapshot surely has the contact I need.

Spanning Backup then proceeded to restore all of my contacts, still those that were not deleted, creating over 360 duplicate contacts. I realised this had happened when all my contacts started showing up twice along my Android phone, though at first I thought something mustiness be misguided with the phone. It turns out this is not a bug, but a feature: Spanning Backup calls this "not-damaging restore," and it means Spanning Backup never deletes your present contacts when it restores an old stand-in, even if duplicates are created. Completely contacts restored are put into a group screening they were restored, so you can evoke the contacts you take, so edit every last other contacts in the radical. This makes sense, merely it as wel requires good indecorum with Gmail's groups interface and bathroom be confusing otherwise.

Spanning Backup screenshot — Spanning Backup's calendar restoration interface focuses on snapshots, and leaves much to be desired.

The same thing happened when I tried to restitute a calendar event: Spanning created a new calendar with the event I restored. While I understand wherefore this is necessary, IT was confusing at the sentence. If Spanning Backup sent an automated netmail explaining what's active on when you restore something, that could help alleviate the confusion.

Contrary to my experience with Contacts and Calendar, Spanning Backup's Gmail interface was brilliant. The user interface shows a mirror image of the diarrhetic Gmail interface, with the corresponding label Tree and conversation headers. To try it, I deleted a conversation in Gmail (conveyed IT to the Bin), and then deleted it from the Bin. Unremarkably, one time you do this, the conversation really is away for good. I then set the conversation on Spanning (without having to look at with snapshots), and clicked Restore. Within moments, the conversation previously "deleted forever" was back in my inbox, with a label display it was restored by Spanning Fill-in. That was a satisfying moment indeed.

Spanning Accompaniment gets a lot of things right: The terms, the easy setup, and the brilliant Gmail port. If that same visual easiness makes it to the Calendar, Contacts, and Docs restoring interfaces, Spanning Backup would be a truly exceptional service.

Take note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's web site, where you stool purpose this Web-based software.

–Erez Zukerman