Monday 21 September 2009

Bonkey on Vista

One of Bonkey's users, Biskits, figured out how to get Bonkey running on Vista and kindly shared the following tips (monkey see, monkey do!):
  1. Uninstall Bonkey, restart the machine and download the newest version of Bonkey (see http://thebackupmonkey.blogspot.com/2009/09/update-improved-background-backup.html).
  2. Go into the Windows MMC (Microsoft Management Console) > Services, and check that the Bonkey Service is "Automatic" and "Started". If yes, close the MMC and go to Step #4. If not, go to Step # 3.
  3. Set the Bonkey Service to "Automatic" and "Start", close the MMC, and re-boot.
  4. In Windows Explorer, navigate to C:\Program Files\Bonkey\ and locate the following 2 executable files: Bonkey.exe, and wrapper.exe. For each file, Right click, select "Properties" > "Compatibility" > and place a check-mark in "Run as Administrator". Close Explorer.
  5. Open Bonkey, and configure your back-ups. When you close the UI, the Service will run effectively according to schedule.
Thanks for the instructions, Biskits! Thanks for being so complicated, Vista!

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi many thanks for Bonkey, which looks like exactly what I (and plenty of other folks) need for peace of mind. It's surprising how many programs either don't allow scheduling in any straightforward way (MS Sync Toy) or archive in some format that means you can't see where the the file you need to retrieve is (too many to mention). I haven't actually managed to drag a folder over to a Backup Group yet, but hopefully I'll see what I'm doing wrong pretty soon. It would be real frustrating if I couldn't get Bonkey working, because it seems ideal and is nicely laid out too. Cheers from England, Geoff Kendall (imagecoder)

bonkey said...

Thanks Geoff, glad to hear you've found what you are looking for. When adding files and folders to a backup group, drag the folder from the location tree on the right to the backup group, and put it right on top of the backup group icon (see the picture here: http://sites.google.com/site/thebackupmonkey/help/getting-started).

Scott said...

Has anyone figured out how to get Bonkey running on XP? My installation on my wife's computer fails, pointing to a log file which itself contains no useful (to me) information.

(FWIW, it's working great on my Mac Mini, and is just what I've been looking for!)

bonkey said...

Hey Scott,

I've been running Bonkey on XP for a couple of years now, without problems.

My usual advice is to try updating your version of Java.

Bonkey

Anonymous said...

I'm running Bonkey on Windows 7, and it works fine (mostly).

One thing that doesn't seem to work is "large files" support with FTP. When I Ctrl-drag a large file to an FTP target location, it does not display with the "large file" icon and does not copy in chunks. Is this a limitation due to FTP target locations?

bonkey said...

Large files should work with FTP. How long ago did you download Bonkey?

Gasport said...

Does this work on Windows 7?

bonkey said...

I have no idea - give it a try and let me know!

Dustin said...

Bonkey is great! Is there any way I can do a 'Run Now' from command line? For example I would like to put it in my Windows Scheduler and have it backup each time I login...

Thanks!

bonkey said...

Thanks Dustin! There's no command line only version; there should be.

I can't think of a good workaround to do something like "backup on login" either. The config files are simple XML though, so you could write a script to play with frequency that runs on login.

But really I should add command line options. I'll add it to the todos.