As for me, I think that an automated backup routine needs to consider that an unattended computer would stay logged in and that it will permute eventually to the log-in window. The backup would then be done during the night time when I am not at my computer. So for security and obvious reasons, these 2 premisses are required.
As for the sleep mode problem, there is an elegant and efficient solution that is provided by the Power Manager utility (
http://www.dssw.co.uk). It can perform multiple wake and sleep to allow different procedures to take place when unattended.
I then also vote for a way for SD to perform a backup while I am still logged in and when the login window is the front-most.
I wrote a script that monitors the computer's activity, not only mouse move and keyboard strokes. A process working in background should also be considered before putting a computer to sleep. This is the reason for this script. It was also designed to permutates the user to the login window when left unatended. In my point of vue, this feature should have been integrated to OS X long time ago. Hoping this will be implemented soon in SD.
Thanks for reading.
Robert Lespérance
Québec, Canada
P.S. Since Retrospect and Backup already includes this feature is a good reason for this integration.