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AFAICT Backblaze does back up .git directories. I have many repos backed up. The .git directory is hidden by default in the web UI (along with all other hidden files), but there is an option to show them.

You should try downloading one of your backed up git repos to see if it actually does contain the full history, I just checked several and everything looks good.


I commented on this topic elsewhere on this page. This is an email from 2021. Maybe they changed policy but here:

> Bob (Backblaze Help)

> Aug 5, 2021, 11:33 PDT

> Hello there,

> Thank you for taking the time to write in,

> Unfortunately .git directories are excluded by Backblaze by default. File

> changes within .git directories occur far too often and over so many files

> that the Backblaze software simply would not be able to keep up. It's beyond

> the scope of our application.

> The Personal Backup Plan is a consumer grade backup product. Unfortunately we

> will not be able to meet your needs in this regard.

> Let me know if you have any other questions.

> Regards,

> Bob The Backblaze Team


> changes within .git directories occur far too often and over so many files that the Backblaze software simply would not be able to keep up.

I don’t really understand that. I’m using Windows File History, and while it’s limited to backing up changes only every 15 minutes, and is writing to a local network drive, it doesn’t seem to have any trouble with .git directories.


>File changes within .git directories occur far too often[..]

That's a crazy statement. The cloud backup system I use can be configured to how often it should bother even looking for new files, and for the section where I have my .git repos (they're actually "bare" git repos and I push to them, locally) I've set it to every two hours. Which is actually overkill because they absolutely do not change that quickly.


This is idiotic. All they have to do is schedule them and then introduce enough hysteresis to not constantly churn on their end. Even if they backed up at most once a day this would be better than this idiocy.

I'd be really curious to know why that's working for you and not me. I just tried restoring and none of my .git directories were included; just the working copy. I tried with both the web and desktop restore tool.

There's no mention of .git being excluded in the Settings or on their support page (https://www.backblaze.com/computer-backup/docs/supported-bac...); they just silently decided to not back up a bunch of my files without telling me... wonderful.


Unfortunately I do not know, I haven’t done anything to configure this as far as I am aware. I am on macOS.

Deleting C:\Programdata\Backblaze\bzdata\bzexcluderules_mandatory.xml resolve the problem for me. Seems like at one point[1] they started excluding .git directories by default, got a bunch of backlash, reverted that change, but never changed the setting back for some users (like me).

[1]: https://www.reddit.com/r/backblaze/comments/1cgy93n/i_did_a_...


Thanks. Silently ignoring .git folders would be much more egregious than not backing up cloud drives in my opinion. The latter is at least somewhat understandable, though they should have been more transparent about it.

Okay nevermind, I just checked and none of my git repos are being backed up; just the working copy. That's pretty awful.

Does the UI atleast hint there's hidden files or is it only by going to the filters you can find this out?

It seems incredibly stupid for a BACKUP PROGRAM to not list the hidden files instead of indicating they're hidden (e.g. _(hidden)_.git)


> Can you imagine saying the same thing about oxycodone or cigarettes?

No, but unfortunately I can very easily imagine people saying it, just like the people who made loads of money from pushing those products did. Also just like the people who are profiting from the spread of gambling are saying now.

Why would someone choose to do a thing if it harms them? There are good arguments against laws that restrict personal freedoms, but this isn't one of them.


But what if we're talking about a product that you're giving away to children? I agree that for adults, cigarettes are fine. But in this case, you're actively designing to maximize tweens and teens engagement and the end result is them saying that they wan't to stop but can't.

Though to be fair, I was mostly pointing out the fact that this was a pretty dumb thing to say for a case like this, especially in a jury trial.


Yes, I agree with you, I think that regulation is needed here and that this was a dumb thing to say. I'm just saying that my reaction to Zuckerberg saying that people must love his product if they use it a lot is exactly what I'd expect him to say. It's also exactly why other parties must step in.


Prod in this context doesn't refer to one person's website for their personal project. It refers to an environment where downtime has consequences, generally one that multiple people work on and that many people rely on.


This is a bit of a no true Scotsman take but I agree with it anyway.


It is not a personal project.


The "this isn't new it's always been happening" talk is disingenuous and incorrect. Yes, there has been some evidence of insider trading over the previous years. However, the scope and frequency of evidence pointing to insider trading since the Trump administration took power is orders of magnitude larger than was happening previously.

The 2020 insider trading scandal dealt with amounts in the hundreds of thousands and low millions. The sudden trading happening right before Trump makes announcements that majorly affect the stock market is in the hundreds of millions.

This isn't business as usual.


The point of the metaphor is not to say "spending time is mechanically similar to putting things in a container". It is to look at spending time from a new angle, and see if it helps you understand it better. A wise person sees a metaphor as a launching point for thought, not as an expression of a metaphysical connection.

Yes, there are bad metaphors, and people who take metaphors too seriously. That you can conjure a bad metaphor with somewhat similar to semantics to some other metaphor does not mean that said metaphor is bad.


> it seems more like a downstream consequence of the fact that there’s no real innovation anymore

This doesn't sound right to me. We are currently getting smacked upside the head by an enormous technological innovation. I believe that, even within the framework of capitalism, this problem has social and political roots. The "robber baron" period late 19th century America has strong similarities to what we are seeing today, and technological stagnation was not the cause.


When are we throwing anti-trust at the robber barons? That's the real question.

And as of now, we are not having "technological innovation". We found a new jackhammer and are tearing up the entire house experimenting with it. Maybe when the "shiny new thing" effect wears off we'll get true innovation. But as of now people are just getting paid to show off jackhammers.


No, because the function of code is distinct from the implementation of the code. With software, something that is functionally identical can be created with a different underlying implementation. This is not the case with media.


Will you elaborate on the “indefensibly bad legislation”?


This is just unrealistic day dreaming. You can go be in a field picking produce for work - we have a shortage of these laborers. Most people don’t actually want to do that, they want a cushy office job that doesn’t wear down their body and that offers them the ability to increase their skill and value over time.

The software engineer who thinks they’d be happier working in a field is largely just a grass is always greener phenomenon. It turns out that for most people, they don’t like work whatever it is, because work is done not by choice but by necessity.


As a teenager I worked at a company that rented rafts for a short trip down a river. We’d take the rafts from the customers at the end and truck them back up to the start. As they became bigger and busier, it became more important to keep track of the status of rafts and know when they were going to be getting back to the top.

They paid tens of thousands to have software made for this purpose. It sucked and was totally unable to handle the simultaneous realtime access and modification that was required.

They knew I was good with computers, so asked me if I had any ideas. In about an hour I made them a Google Sheet that worked great for the next several years until I left.


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