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-   -   Ignore folder on target disk? (https://www.shirt-pocket.com/forums/showthread.php?t=528)

thaistickdick 07-10-2005 03:14 PM

Ignore folder on target disk?
 
Is this possible?

In CarbonCopyCloner there's the built in feature that any folder created at the root level of the disk or volume you are cloning too is always ignored, and so won't be overwritten or amended by the clone operation.

I know SD has many more options than CCC and the 'different' and 'new' scripts will allow files to be preserved on the target volume, but I'm not sure that is going to work well in my situation.

I want to keep a perfect bootable clone of my main system but temporarily (while I'm travelling and while my usual file storage backup volume is chock-a-block full) I'd like to put a few files on the clone drive and store them there.

But if I use the 'different' or 'new' scripts there's the likelihood that my clone will not be bootable, and certainly won't be identical to my main drive.

Does this make sense? Not sure I've explained it too well :)

dnanian 07-10-2005 03:33 PM

I certainly understand what you're saying.

In general, I strongly encourage people to create a partition, and to NOT mix data and backups: it's just not a good practice.

But, if you want, you can "simulate" the same kind of thing by carefully using a symlink.

Here's how to achieve the same thing:

Create your bootable backup. In the root of the drive, create a folder that you're going to use to store the "temporary" items.

On the original drive, open terminal and create a symlink to that folder, in the same location. In other words, let's assume that your backup drive is called "Backup", and on there you've created a folder in the root called "the-special-folder". So, you'd use the following command:

ln -s /Volumes/Backup/the-special-folder /the-special-folder

When you use Smart Update (or copy different/newer -- DO NOT USE ERASE, THEN COPY in this situation), SuperDuper! knows not to replace a folder with a symlink to itself. So, when you update the backup from the source, it'll see the symlink, recognize that it's pointing to the same folder it's about to replace, and it'll skip it instead.

I hope that makes sense. Give it a try with non-crucial data first, to make sure you've got the hang of it. And -- anyone else reading this thread -- use a partition if you can, and only do this IF YOU MUST.

thaistickdick 07-10-2005 04:06 PM

Thanks Dave.

I've tried the Terminal command but I'm getting the message 'In /X_Stuff: No such file or directory'.

My backup volume is called "X Backup" and I ran the command "ln -s /Volumes/X Backup/X_Stuff /X_Stuff" after I had created the X_Stuff folder on the backup volume.

I'm a bit of a Terminal cretin and haven't used symlinks before, so I don't know if I should see a symlink folder appear on my main volume or not. Does it work in a similar way to an alias?

After reading your comments though I think I may just try to free up some space on my main and storage volumes and leave the backup one well alone. I've already had my firewire port (or cable, I'm unable to check until I can get out to a store) fried this week, so I'm having to do backups via USB 1.1. I'd be miffed if I screwed up and had to re-clone.

I appreciate you taking the time to reply though.

dnanian 07-10-2005 04:11 PM

Ah, that's likely because you typed the command incorrectly. It's "LN" in lower case, not "IN". Note that, once you're past the "ln -s" part, you can use "Tab" to complete your typing. And, if there are spaces in a folder name, you need to quote the name or precede the special character with a backslash. So, in your case, it'd be:

ln -s "/Volumes/X Backup/X_Stuff" /X_Stuff

When the command works properly, you should see a symlink appear in the main folder, definitely...

(This wouldn't make you re-clone. If you do it wrong, it'll delete the folder on the destination volume, which is why I requsted that you test first!)

thaistickdick 07-10-2005 04:23 PM

LOL, see, definitely a cretin.

That worked great thanks. Symlink appears on the main volume.

I'll have to try the clone job in the morning though as it's late now, but I'll let you know how it went.

Cheers

tsd

dnanian 07-10-2005 04:28 PM

Not a cretin, tsd. Terminal's awfully picky, but very useful, too.


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