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Selectively Pruning Time Machine Backups![[wlammers]](/webx/?30@@1) wlammers - 03:31pm May 1, 2008 PSTMatt Neuberg says re selectively deleting TM Backups using the Action menu while in TM:
"See where the Action menu says "Delete Backup" and "Delete All Backups Of...? The former deletes just this instance of the file, the latter all copies of the file, from the backups folder." I've found essentially this same language elsewhere on the web. But when I select "Delete Backup", even with an individual file selected, it does not delete "just this instance of the file." It deletes that entire day's backup. Is it just me? Or is this in fact the way it behaves for everyone? I've tried it twice, and it did the same thing both times, essentially wiping out two weeks' backups of every file on my system. Although they are old backups, from late last year, and I assume those days no longer preserved anything crucial to me, the fact is, I don't really know. And certainly if I'd happened to try this on a more recent backup, I would be concerned. Did I maybe miss something? Is there in fact a way to delete just a single backup of a single file? When I think about it, based on the wording on the Action menu, it actually makes sense to me that it might delete the entire day's backup. If it was intended to delete just the one file, I'd think it would say "Delete this backup of..." (or some such). Wayne
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Re: Selectively Pruning Time Machine Backups
On May 1, 2008, at 3:31 PM, wlammers wrote:
> Did I maybe miss something? Is there in fact a way to delete just a
> single backup of a single file? When I think about it, based on the
> wording on the Action menu, it actually makes sense to me that it
> might delete the entire day's backup. If it was intended to delete
> just the one file, I'd think it would say "Delete this backup
> of..." (or some such).
Well, a suitably crafted unlink command in Terminal has a good chance.
But I'm not going to try it, since I don't know what meta information
might be lurking somewhere invisible.
See man unlink
--John
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Re: Selectively Pruning Time Machine Backups
On or about 5/1/08 3:31 PM, thus spake "wlammers" <wlammers  mac.com>:
> But when I select "Delete Backup", even with an individual file selected, it
> does not delete "just this instance of the file." It deletes that entire day's
> backup. Is it just me? Or is this in fact the way it behaves for everyone?
>
> I've tried it twice, and it did the same thing both times, essentially wiping
> out two weeks' backups of every file on my system. Although they are old
> backups, from late last year, and I assume those days no longer preserved
> anything crucial to me, the fact is, I don't really know. And certainly if I'd
> happened to try this on a more recent backup, I would be concerned.
>
> Did I maybe miss something?
More likely that I just screwed up. m.
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Re: Selectively Pruning Time Machine Backups
On May 2, 2008, at 1:33 PM, Matt Neuburg wrote:
>> But when I select "Delete Backup", even with an individual file
>> selected, it
>> does not delete "just this instance of the file." It deletes that
>> entire day's
>> backup. Is it just me? Or is this in fact the way it behaves for
>> everyone?
>>
>> I've tried it twice, and it did the same thing both times,
>> essentially wiping
>> out two weeks' backups of every file on my system. Although they
>> are old
>> backups, from late last year, and I assume those days no longer
>> preserved
>> anything crucial to me, the fact is, I don't really know. And
>> certainly if I'd
>> happened to try this on a more recent backup, I would be concerned.
>>
>> Did I maybe miss something?
>
> More likely that I just screwed up. m.
Um, no, not you.
I think it's pretty clear that, after a certain time, Time Machine
does not keep backups for every hour or every day. When you deleted an
old backup, it was a week's worth of backups; which, as far as I
understand, is the backup at the end of the week in question, not any
in between. When you go into Time Machine, and look at the time bar on
the right, you can see that, after one month, you no longer have daily
backups.
Kirk
Read my blog: Kirkville -- http://www.mcelhearn.com
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Re: Selectively Pruning Time Machine Backups
The hourly backups disappear after 24 hours (roughly), and the daily backups disappear after a month, but one of the daily backups per week is still preserved long term--I believe until the volume is out of space. I've only tried it on backups old enough to be in the weekly category, but I'm assuming at this point that the "Delete Backup" command will delete not just a single selected file, but the entire backup in which the selected file is included--whether it's an hourly, daily, or weekly backup.
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