Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage continues to grow in popularity as developers, IT personnel, and more realize the benefits of affordable cloud storage. Our Backblaze B2 engineering team continues to add features and capabilities to B2 Cloud Storage that our users identify as being helpful in getting their job done. Here’s a collection of recent updates to Backblaze B2 you may find useful.
5MB Large File Part Size: When working with large files, the minimum file part size can now be set as low as 5MB versus the previous low setting of 100MB. The range of a file part when working with large files can be from 5MB to 5GB. We recommend using the default of 100MB, but in cases where RAM is limited, a smaller size can be useful.
SHA-1 at the End: This feature allows you to compute the SHA-1 checksum and append it to the end of the request body versus doing the computation before sending the file. This is especially useful for those applications which stream data to Backblaze B2.
Cache Control: When data is downloaded from B2 Cloud Storage into a browser, the length of time the file remains in the browser cache can be set using the following syntax:
where NNN is the number of seconds to cache the file.
Cache Control policies are set at the bucket level using the b2_create_bucket and b2_update_bucket API calls. Setting this policy is optional.
Life Cycle Rules: Create rules that allow you to manage the length of time deleted files will remain in your B2 Cloud Storage bucket before deletion. A great option for managing the cleanup of outdated file versions to save on storage costs.
Time Machine Backup: You may know that you can use your Synology NAS as the destination for your Time Machine backup. With B2 Cloud Storage you can also sync your Synology NAS to Backblaze B2 for a true 3-2-1 backup solution.
Backblaze B2 User Groups: Backblaze B2 users can now use Backblaze B2 along with the new Backblaze Groups Management functionality. Group Management allows administrators to pay for their team’s B2 Cloud Storage usage and Managed Groups even allow administrators to share access to Backblaze B2-enabled accounts.
Backblaze B2 Integrations
Here are a couple of recently completed B2 Cloud Storage integrations:
Retrospect: A proven backup and archive service for servers, virtual machines, and more. Now you can choose Backblaze B2 as a cloud storage destination.
Cantemo: A media asset management system that allows you to create sophisticated rules to automatically route, archive, and restore an asset or collection to and from B2 Cloud Storage.
Odds and Ends
If you’re new to B2 Cloud Storage, check out our recent Backblaze B2 demo webinar (registration required). The demo will introduce you to Backblaze B2 and show you how you can use B2 Cloud Storage to back up, archive, and sync your data to the Backblaze B2 cloud.
If you have suggestion for a Backblaze B2 feature or enhancement, let us know by contacting Backblaze B2 support. Thanks.
