BACKUP

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Supported DOS versions:	MS-DOS 1 - 5
How easy to use?	Moderate
How safe to use?	Fairly safe
How common?	Less well known
Internal or external command?	External

Description

Backs up up files from one disk to another

Command Syntax

BACKUP source destination_drive [/s] [/m] [/a] [/f:[size]] [/d:date] [/t:time] [/l:[[path]logfile]]

source is the file, directory or drive you wish to copy from
destination_drive is the drive you wish to copy to
/s includes all files that are subdirectories of source (which must be a drive or directory)
/m backs up only the files that have changed since the last backup
/a adds files to the backup disk rather than replacing them
/f:[size] formats the destination disk if necessary. You can only use the size in DOS 4+ and it is one of 160K, 180K, 320K 360K, 720K, 1.2M or 1.44M
/d:[date] backs up only files changed on or after date
/t:[time] backs up only files changed on or after time
/l creates a list of all the files backed up. In DOS 3.3 and earlier you can't specify a name or path for it. In DOS 4+ you can. If you don't (or can't) give it a name, the file is called BACKUP.LOG

Comments

BACKUP can be used to back up a hard disk but it isn't very efficient. It can also be used to split up a large file so it will fit on several floppy disks. Useful for copying files between computers. A popular alternative is PKZip or WinZip.

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