How to Backup Your Recently Used Files
to the Internet (for free)

By J.D. Solomon
JDS Strategic Communications

Every Friday I do this simple backup routine. It automatically sends all the Office documents I've used in the past week to my free Internet email account, so I can access them on the weekend or the following week if I'm not at work — or if disaster strikes and my computer dies.

Here's the 3-step process in a nutshell:

1. Use Windows Search to get a list of all Office files created or modified in the past week.
2. Package all those files into a compressed zip file.
3. Email that zip file to a free Internet e-mail account for storage or remote access.

First, you'll need a free Internet email account that you'll use for your weekly backups. I use my Yahoo Mail account because it now offers 250MB of storage, plenty of room for a lot of files. If you don't have an Internet email account, set one up at mail.yahoo.com, then return to this page.

You'll also need to use a file compression (zip) program. There's one included with Windows XP, but I use WinZip because it includes a nifty feature that allows you to zip a collection of selected files and e-mail it with a single mouse click. (You'll see how WinZip saves you several steps in a moment.)

First, set up and save your weekly search:

1. Click on the Start icon and select Search.
2. For Type, select Documents.
3. For Last modified, select Within the last week.
4. Click Use Advanced Search Features.
5. For Look in, browse to My Documents.
6. Click Search and wait for the search to be completed.
7. From the View menu at the top of the window, select Details.
8. From the File menu, select Save Search.
9. Save the search as Weekly Backup on your Desktop.

Each week, do this to backup your recently used files and store them on the Internet:

1. Double-click the Weekly Backup search program on your Desktop. This will launch the Search that you set up in the previous step.
2. When the search is completed, select the files you want to back up. (Ctrl-A to select all; Ctrl-click to highlight selected files). Then right-click any of the highlighted files.
3. If you use WinZip: From the right-click menu select WinZip --> Zip and Email. A familiar email window will open with the zip file already attached. Just insert your address for your free Internet email account, insert a Subject and click Send. You're done.
3. If you use the Windows file compression program: From the right-click menu select Send To --> Compressed (zipped) folder. Next, find that newly compressed folder in My Documents. (It will have the same name as the first file in the list that you selected for compression; it may be easier to find if you sort the My Documents folder by date.) Right-click on that compressed folder and select Send To --> Mail Recipient. A familiar New Message window will open with the zip file already attached. Just insert your address for that free Internet email account, insert a Subject and click Send. Finally, return to your My Documents folder and delete the now-unneeded compressed folder.

By the way, don't worry about your Subject line or the name that Windows or WinZip assigns to the compressed folder; your emails are date-stamped when they arrive in your Internet email account.

Need your files? Log onto your Internet email account and download the attached Zip file from your latest back-up.