Beginning with WinZip 26.0, additional applets for enabling quickly performing specific operations have been added. One of these, the WinZip Simple Secure Backup, enables backing up a smaller set of specific files. This section of help regards the Advanced Secure Backup features in WinZip.

WinZip Backups and the Job Wizard

What are WinZip jobs?

Data backup consists of copying or archiving files for the purpose of being able to restore them in case of data loss. Data loss can occur from many sources ranging from computer viruses to hardware failures to file corruption and so on. If you're a business, you may have lost critical financial, customer, and company data. If the data resides on a personal computer, you could lose financial data and other key files, pictures, music, etc. that would be hard to replace.

WinZip^® jobs found on the Backup tab automate the process of creating and updating Zip files. They are great for your repetitive zipping tasks, such as:

• Periodic data backups
• Periodic data archival
• Periodic packaging and transmission of reports, spreadsheets, etc.

WinZip jobs let you specify what files you want zipped, how you want them zipped, and where the resulting Zip files should go. If you want to fully automate the process, you can even specify when you want them to run.

You can create your own jobs using the WinZip Job Wizard, or you can use pre-configured jobs, included with WinZip Pro and WinZip Enterprise, to quickly zip common items such as Documents, the Desktop, or your Windows Mail or Outlook email.

The Job Wizard

The easy-to-use Job Wizard helps you to create your own jobs to archive your files. It guides you, in a few quick steps, through the process of specifying exactly how your job should work.

Using the Job Wizard you can specify:

• Which files and folders you want to zip, and how they should be compressed.
• What the Zip file should be named and where it should go. Zip file names can include variable components such as the date and time so that new Zip files won't overwrite existing Zip files.
• How you want file attributes and dates to be used when evaluating which files should be zipped, and whether existing Zip files should be replaced or updated. (For those familiar with standard backup programs, these options combine to specify backup types such as "normal", "incremental", "differential", etc.)
• Whether you want to encrypt files when they are zipped.
• What folder information should be stored in the Zip file.
• Whether the job should be scheduled to run automatically and, if so, when.
• Whether the Zip file created by the job should be saved to a cloud or FTP location, emailed, and/or shared via social media or instant messaging.

The Job Wizard allows you to set many other options, yet it is very easy to use. For example, the only thing that it requires you to specify is which files you want to zip; the Wizard will supply reasonable values for all the remaining settings.

Where can I learn more?

• Learn about creating and modifying WinZip jobs using the WinZip Job Wizard
• Learn about running WinZip jobs
• Learn about the predefined backups included with WinZip
• Read about security considerations of WinZip jobs
• Read more about Data Backup Strategies
• Read about Restoring Data Backups

Important notes

• WinZip jobs are intended for data backup and archival only. WinZip's job feature is not designed or intended for use as a full system backup utility. For example, WinZip jobs may not be able to zip files that are currently in use, including Windows system files. For system backups you should use tools specifically designed for that purpose.
• Please read and understand the security considerations of WinZip jobs before you create or run any jobs.
• Although WinZip jobs are very powerful, and are suitable for most users, advanced users and system administrators should consider using the WinZip Command Line Support Add-On for their most exacting needs. WinZip jobs can perform most tasks efficiently, but cannot, for example, select files for zipping based on their dates. If you find that the Job Wizard does not provide all of the options you need for a particular task, try the Command Line Support Add-On. The add-on is free for registered WinZip users and is available from the WinZip web site.