It has happened to almost everyone I know, and it's a tough lesson to learn. After laboring for hours on a paper or project, the computer freezes, lightning strikes, or a fuse blows. Replicating your efforts will be impossible. How can you prevent this from happening? Save your work regularly! Click on the disk icon after you finish each paragraph or once you finally get your graphic looking just right.

Even if you take great care in saving your work, you might put your disk into the computer and find that a file is corrupt or the computer cannot read the disk. If you made a backup, you’re in luck! A backup is the same as your original, but saved in a different location. When working at home, save the file to both your hard drive and to a disk. If you use a public computer, either save the file on two different disks or e-mail a copy of the file to yourself. Always save the most recent incarnation of your work in both places.

Portable media options for saving computer files include floppy disks, CDs, zip disks, and USB flash drives. Floppy disks are the small 3.5 inch square disks. They are inexpensive, but have the smallest amount of memory and are slowly being phased out. Some newer computers, such as the library’s teen homework computers, do not have floppy drives, but you can borrow an external floppy drive from the reference department for library use.

If you plan to save pictures, graphics, or large files, you should look into the other options. CDs come in two formats—CD-R and CD-RW. Once you save a file on a CD-R, you cannot edit it. You will need a CD-RW if you anticipate making any changes. Zip disks are less common and more expensive than floppy disks. They are physically thicker and can hold much more information. The final type of portable storage, and my personal favorite, is the USB flash drive. This newer technology is easy to use, holds a lot of information, and is more stable than a floppy disk. The price of flash drives depends on the brand and amount of storage.

You can purchase floppy disks, CDs, zip disks and flash drives at office supply stores or stores with an electronics department. Also, the reference department sells floppy disks and CD-Rs for $1 and CD-RWs for $2.

Take it from someone who has been there—saving your work will save your sanity!