How do you manage your text and photo archives?

[FJ and G]

Over the years (and decades for some of us), we have amassed large quantities of railroad and toy train photos, articles, forum downloads of tips and other items like magazines and books. Keeping it all tidy has become a real chore for me and I'd like to hear how you have managed.

Photos.

I've got thousands of photos and slides from the 60s and 70s and 80s of railroads all over the US, East Asia and Australia that are sitting in boxes and are probably deteriorating as we speak. My eventual goal (if ever I get around to it) will be to scan them in and put them on CDs.

But will CDs be around for 100 years? Already, jump drives and iPods are become more prevalent.

About the only photos I scanned in were some I took of the now abandoned FJ&G back in 70 and 71, that a fellow used for his web site:

http://www.fjgrr.org/railpage34.html

Today, I have a digital camera and I must take 30 toy train and real train photos on average a day. I've created computer folders that I store them in by month; arranging them in a numerical sequence coding that automatically sorts them, i.e.

0501
0502
0503 and so on, indicating Jan, Feb, Mar of 2005.

Text.

Magazines and books are on shelves and in boxes awaiting processing. NOTHING is thrown away. There are diagrams and documents that are becoming yellow and also should probably be scanned in someday and digitized.

BTW, if you ever download stuff from the internet in PDF format, you will notice that there are a lot of returns after each line. If you ever wi***o eliminate the returns, I've cracked the code on how to do it.

First, put another return between places you wi***o have paragraphs and sub-headlines.

Then, follow this sequence using the “search and replace” command. I assume you are using MS Word, but other programs have similar functions.

Go to “special” which gives you additional options in search and replace menu. “Special” may be hidden but it can be opened with a tiny arrow or the word “more” button at the bottom of the menu.

Click on special and go up to “paragraph mark”. Enter paragraph mark twice in search for

Enter 2 carrots in replace with. Carrots look like this ^

Hit replace all

Then, enter paragraph in replace and enter a space using your space bar in replace with

Hit replace all

Then, replace 2 carrots with 2 paragraphs

Hit replace all.

That should do it.

The sequence, once again, looks like this:

Replace para/para with ^^ (replace all)
Replace para with “space” (replace all)
Replace ^^ with para/para (replace all)

[tjsprague]

Once you start trying to archive photos you'll find that CDs are way too small. You may want to get a DVD burner. That's 5+ GB of storage per disc.

Will CDs be around in 100 years? As artifacts, possibly as collectibles on ebay? But we won't be around in a hundred years either.

Tim

[FJ and G]

Tim writes: "But we won't be around in a hundred years either."

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I don't know. I'm boning up on garlic, onions and sardines. That and RC Cola and Moon Pies ought to keep me going for at least another century.

[spankybird]

I am only ten and have a live span of 120 years, so yea I will be around in a 100 years.

[cnw1995]

This is an interesting subject, David. I think our responses would echo our personal preferences about data. I don't keep much in general related to the hobby - because I am finding I can re-find the data I need on line when I need it. I have a few years worth of CTT and other magazines, but I'm pruning them as I go because I use them less as a reference than as just fun things to re-read. CTT ages well in that regard! I have photos on Sony's old Imagestation that are years-old but if they suddenly disappeared, I wouldn't be bereft. I kind of update the photos I have in my own server space. I vigorously vet the digital photos I take - and print the best. 'Paper' photos archive well.

[Anonymous]

I keep them on a seperate hard drive, they go onto CD's for now.

Eventually the best of the bunch will be stored elsewhere on DVD.