What is the best mechanism to manage files for a single user working on different computers at different physical places?

Question

Background

I am working on 3 different computers at different physical places: a home computer at home, a lab computer at univ laboratory and an unknown computer at unknown place.

My data files are 1 tera bytes in total. So it does not make sense if I host it on a commercial file hosting company or on a dedicated file server.

Wherever I go, I always bring a portable external hard disk as my mobile central repository containing the data files. This hard disk is protected by Microsoft BitLocker and the data files are managed using TortoiseSvn protocol. All computers mentioned above checkout the repository to make a local copy. I must update my local copy before start working on the computers. Any changes on the files will be committed to the repository.

Problem

I realize there is a possibility that the portable hard disk gets damaged, lost, etc. If this happens, the computer making the last update will be the most up-to-date backup from which a new portable hard disk as the central repository must be recovered.

Note: I need not to worry about data abusing because the BitLocker prevents others from using my data.

Question

Is there a better way to accomplish what I do above?

Answer 1

This seems to be a very risky thing that you are doing. If your data is really important, then you are always at a risk of losing it.

Here is what I would do in such a situation:

1. Setup a SVN server at probably my home computer.
2. Expose this SVN Server through http or https. Off course, you will have to buy domain name and all the other stuff with it. There are different ways through which you can run a live website through your home computer. Hint: You will have to buy static IP for that. This particular point's implementation will needs more detailed knowledge on your part.
3. Connect to this SVN server through TortoiseSVN client (or any other SVN client) from all the client machines (lab, unknown machine and home client machine).
4. Put in a replication and backup policy at the server machine to backup the data every 'n' number of days/hours/months depending on the frequency of data changes.
5. Preferably, the backup should be on a different machine but if your budget doesn't allow this, then it should be at least on a different hard disk.