Will compliance spell the end of optical storage? |
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EXPERT RESPONSE FROM: Mike Casey
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QUESTION POSED ON: 02 April 2004
Will compliance spell the end of optical storage?
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Not necessarily. Optical storage can be good for long-term archiving (off-line vaults), especially if you're saving data -- such as key documents and reports -- for more than 10 years. Optical media is probably more stable and readable over the years than tape media. The issue is technological obsolescence: do the drives and software still exist, that can read the data? This was a big problem with unique 14" and 5.25" WORM formats, but current CD-ROM formats are likely to be readable for many years, due to the format's use in consumer products.
At the logical level, saving data in standard formats like XML or PDF -- rather than proprietary database formats -- is another good approach for long-term archiving.
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