DVCS and data loss?

Question

After almost two years of using DVCS, it seems that one inherent "flaw" is accidental data loss: I have lost code which isn't pushed, and I know other people who have as well.

I can see a few reasons for this: off-site data duplication (ie, "commits have to go to a remote host") is not built in, the repository lives in the same directory as the code and the notion of "hack 'till you've got something to release" is prevalent... But that's beside the point.

I'm curious to know: have you experienced DVCS-related data loss? Or have you been using DVCS without trouble? And, related, apart from "remember to push often", is there anything which can be done to minimize the risk?

Answer 1

I have lost data from a DVCS, both because of removing the tree along with the repository (not remembering it had important information), and because of mistakes in using the DVCS command line (git, in the specific case): some operation that was meant to revert a change that I made actually deleted a number of already-committed revisions from the repository.