PhotoRec is file data recovery software designed to recover lost files including video, documents and archives from Hard Disks and CDRom and lost pictures (thus, its 'Photo Recovery' name) from digital camera memory. PhotoRec ignores the filesystem and goes after the underlying data, so it will still work even if your media's filesystem has been severely damaged or re-formatted
http://spindrop.us/2009/02/18/database-versus-files-for-images/
This link is now broken.
about:
Dave gives his feedback on a long-debated developement topic : storing files in database or on the filesystem.
"I had been serving images via the database. Immediately when I switched to the filesystem I saw a huge benefit. Not just a drop in database connections, but overall ?zippiness? in the site.
We?ll see how well this performs in the real world, but I am quite sure that I learned my lesson."
All this makes sense : files are not data, they are just files. A filesystem is designed for hosting files. A database is designed for hosting data. Don't mess things.
The GNU/Linux Semantic Storage System (GLS³) is a solution designed to facilitate the management and retrieval of your data. It is a solution that distances you from thinking about Where you store your data to What your data is. With GLS³, you can organize and retrieve your data based on their semantics, based on What they mean to you, and not based on their hierarchical location.