Strange behavior of "GET INFO" command

[popeye]

After running an incremental backup, I checked my GET INFO for a jpeg and found that the program names were all duplicated in the pulldown bar. To fix this, I had to trash the LaunchServices caches in System/Library/Caches directory and restart immediately. I have replicated this behavior precisely, checking GET INFO just before and just after running an incremental backup. Running subsequent backups (I do it every day) without doing this fix produces a duplication of the application choices up to 5 each!

What gives? Anyone else had similar issues?

[dnanian]

Unfortunately, this is LaunchServices being "smart". If you unmount your backup drive, and use Smart Update, we'll mount/backup/unmount, and you shouldn't get the duplicates because LaunchServices won't re-scan the drives...

[popeye]

Thanks. I'll try that this morning. If I understand correctly, start the backup process with the external drive OFF, run incremental backup, and wait for the prompt to turn it on.

[dnanian]

Not off, no: eject it, but leave it on. This is assuming the backup is scheduled, too.

[popeye]

I'm not doing scheduled updates, just daily ones of my laptop at work.

If I turn on the external drive, it mounts of course; if I theneject it and start SuperDuper (what you seem to be saying), I get the "cannot find Backup1" error message, and the only option is to mount with Disk Utility. SuperDuper does not auto-mount my external drive once it is unmounted.

Is it safe or the usual procedure to run a scheduled backup in the background while working on files? I've been closing everything out, then running the incremental backup while doing something else away from my desk.

I ran an incremental backup just now by mounting the backup external drive, running the backup, and unmounting the external drive before doing anything else. This procedure avoided the corruption of the LaunchServices cache.

[dnanian]

OK. If it's not scheduled, the auto mount/unmount won't work (unless you use the "OneTouch" FAQ technique to get a little executable you can run, and use that to execute the backup).

But, as you've seen, doing the steps manually will work.

In general, I don't suggest doing any significant work while backing up -- it can case problems if you're writing files at the exact moment they're being backed up (see the Troubleshooting section of the User's Guide for some details).

You can browse the web and stuff like that, but try not to download...