Personal Backup Version 5.2
	© 2012, J. Rathlev, IEAP, Kiel University

  Clean up a backup directory

From time to time you should delete obsolete files from your backup (or any other directory). Personal Backup offers the Cleanup function to perform this task automatically depending on file types and/or file age. Make sure that all files you plan to delete no longer exist in the source directory, otherwise they will be copied again during the next backup.
In addition, it is possible to delete files manually using any file manager of your choice.

List of most recently-used Cleanup tasks

The program will always retain a list of the most recently-used Cleanup tasks. Selecting a task from the list opens the cleanup window with the saved task settings.

Select the directory to be cleaned up

The directory from which you wish to delete files may be located on a local storage medium, on a Windows network drive or on a directory on an FTP server. Subdirectories are included automatically. By default, all files including any compressed (.gz) and encrypted (.enc) files will be deleted.

• Local or network directory: Clicking the button will open a dialog in which you can select the directory.
• FTP remote directory: Clicking the button will open a dialog in which you can configure the FTP server connection parameters (see here):
  
  After clicking the button, the program will connect to the FTP server and read the remote directory tree of the backup for the user to select a subdirectory.
  Note: In FTP mode not all of the following options are available.

Cleanup mode

• Files: All files in the selected directory and its subdirectories matching the given filter conditions will be deleted.
• Root directories: All files located in the root directories of the selected directory matching the given filter conditions will be deleted.
• Security copies: Only the security copies created during backup and matching the given filter conditions will be deleted.

File filters

Using filename filters will include or exclude filenames matching certain conditions. The same rules are used as described for backup file filters (Standard file filter or Regular expressions).
 

Type selection

The cleanup may be confined to selected types of files (filename extensions). You can select whether only the selected types or all but the selected types will be deleted. Clicking the button will open a dialog to edit the list of file extensions. Extensions are specified without wildcards and dot.
Select the option unpack gz files if your backup was made to single compressed files so that during file selection the additional extension .gz will be ignored.
 

Security copies

If security copies were created during backup these files can be handled separately:

• Deleting files
  Specify the same settings you used for the security copies during backup to prevent these files from being deleted.
• Deleting security copies
  Specify the same settings you used for the security copies during backup to delete only these files.

You can select whether to handle only security copies from backup, from synchronization or both:

• Security copies created during backup
  Specify the same settings you used for the security copies during backup to exclude these files from restore. If placeholders were used for the suffix of the security copies, clicking the button will insert the appropriate filter mask. If a number of prior versions has been saved, replace the counter with the "#" character (e.g. bak-#).
• Security copies created during synchronization
  Specify the same settings you used for the security copies during backup to exclude these files and directories from restore. If placeholders were used, clicking the button will insert the appropriate filter masks.

File or directory age

You can specify whether you want to delete only files or directories older or newer than a given fixed or relative date.

• Relative to actual date: older than the specified number of days, weeks, months or years
• Fixed date: older or newer than the given date

Synchronize

This option is only available when deleting files. You can synchronize the backup directory with a source directory. All files not present at the source will be deleted from the backup directory. Additional restrictions can be made by means of selections concerning file types and age as described above. Possible settings are:

• Off - no synchronization
• With source directory - this option requires a backup directory containing a drive indicator (e.g. LwE) to identify the source drive.
• With following directory - select a directory for synchronization

Options:

Deleted files to recycle bin - files will not be irrecoverably deleted but moved to the Windows recycle bin so that you can recover them if needed. This function is not available with a network drive or FTP directory.
 

Mail delivery after cleanup

As with backups, a mail with status information and optionally a log file can be sent after performing a cleanup task. The settings are the same as for backups.
 

Log settings

Clicking the button will open a dialog to adjust the log settings for the cleanup task.
Click then button to view the current log.
 

Start cleanup

Clicking the button will start the cleanup. Before deleting any files, the program will create and display a list of all files that match the filter conditions. If the selection is incorrect, you can cancel the cleanup at this point and adjust your settings. It is also possible to select or deselect individual files or directories by tagging the checkboxes.

A right-click on a file opens a menu for further control. The selections required for an external file viewer and a file comparison program can be made by clicking the button:

• View file: If no specific viewer such as Lister.exe (see Total Commander package) has been selected, the Windows default file type settings will be used to start the associated program. Compressed or encrypted file will be processed beforehand.
• Compare file: You can use the open source program WinMerge for comparing files. Compressed or encrypted files will be processed before loading.

Load and save cleanup tasks

Clicking the button will save a configured cleanup task with all settings to disk. To load an already-saved task, click the button.

A saved cleanup task can also be started from the command line. It is therefore possible to use the Windows Task Scheduler function, for example, to remove old files from your backup peridiocally.