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-   -   you're booted to a clone! (https://www.shirt-pocket.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7102)

Dan Lester 01-02-2018 11:06 AM

you're booted to a clone!
 
SuperDuper is wonderful, and I use it regularly for backups. I am troubled, however, by the fact that when I'm booted to my clone, there is nothing on my Desktop that indicates that.

Case in point. Let's suppose there is a power failure, and my internal drive craps out. When the power returns, my Mac automatically boots to my clone and, for all intents and purposes, things look exactly the same. If my internal drive craps out, I want to know that asap! But the only way I can know that is by going to "About this Mac" and seeing which startup disk is listed there. I would not ordinarily do that.

This is perhaps more a system issue than a SuperDuper issue, but I'm wondering if there is some strategy that lets the user know that their internal drive has crapped out, and one is booted to a clone.

dnanian 01-02-2018 11:14 AM

It certainly says what you're booted from in "About This Mac", but we intentionally do not change your drive to do something different on the copy. It wouldn't be much of a copy if it wasn't a...copy.

You could, of course, do things in an "On Successful Completion" shell script to mark the copy in some way. But it's definitely something I don't do.

Dan Lester 01-02-2018 12:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dnanian (Post 34088)
It certainly says what you're booted from in "About This Mac", but we intentionally do not change your drive to do something different on the copy. It wouldn't be much of a copy if it wasn't a...copy.

You could, of course, do things in an "On Successful Completion" shell script to mark the copy in some way. But it's definitely something I don't do.

Thanks. The point, of course, is that every time I go use my Mac, I'm not going to go to "About This Mac" and see who I'm booted from.

The "On Successful Completion" is just about what happens when you MAKE the clone. Not when you boot from it.

That's exactly right that a clone is precisely that. It's whole purpose in life is to make a boot that looks exactly like your original boot. So that's why this is more a system issue than a SuperDuper issue. SuperDuper is doing exactly what it's supposed to do. But it would be nice if the system made it more prominent which disk/partition you were booting from. I guess my question was whether there was such an option to make it conspicuous.

dnanian 01-02-2018 12:34 PM

Yes, I know that's going to happen when you make the copy. What I'm saying is you could use a shell script there to set something on the backup that would tell you you're on the copy.

billearl 01-02-2018 12:54 PM

I use an AppleScript script at startup to do some things, including not loading Dropbox if booted from a clone. Something like that could be used to indicate the boot drive is a clone.

Dan Lester 01-02-2018 03:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by billearl (Post 34091)
I use an AppleScript script at startup to do some things, including not loading Dropbox if booted from a clone. Something like that could be used to indicate the boot drive is a clone.

That an interesting idea. Can you be more specific about how that would work and, in particular how the script knows it is booting from a clone? I guess that script would put a message on the screen saying BOOTED FROM CLONE?

Of course, I realize that if I come back to my computer, and am presented with a login screen (I don't usually log out), it means there was a reboot, and I'd be smart to check "About This Mac" to see who I booted from!

dnanian 01-02-2018 03:08 PM

Well, you could potentially replace your desktop image. You could copy a file to your desktop. Something like that. "How this would work" is kind of up to you, Dan. I'm trying to give you a mechanism you can use to achieve your goal...

billearl 01-03-2018 12:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dan Lester (Post 34092)
That an interesting idea. Can you be more specific about how that would work and, in particular how the script knows it is booting from a clone? I guess that script would put a message on the screen saying BOOTED FROM CLONE?

Here's a portion of my startup script. The script is saved as an app (I call it "Startup Actions"), and added to the Login Items list. The icon of the startup disk always appears at the top of the screen.

Code:

tell application "Finder"
        set startupDisk to (startup disk as text)
        if startupDisk is "DiskA:" then
                open file ((path to applications folder as text) & "Dropbox.app")
                set diskList to {"DiskA", "DiskB", "DiskA-X1", "DiskB-X1", "DiskA-X2", "DiskB-X2"}
        end if
        if startupDisk is "DiskA-X1:" then set diskList to {"DiskA-X1", "DiskB-X1", "DiskA", "DiskB", "DiskA-X2", "DiskB-X2"}
        if startupDisk is "DiskA-X2:" then set diskList to {"DiskA-X2", "DiskB-X2", "DiskA", "DiskB", "DiskA-X1", "DiskB-X1"}
        repeat with counter from 1 to length of diskList
                if exists disk (item counter of diskList) then set desktop position of disk (item counter of diskList) of desktop to {2493, 54 + 94 * (counter - 1)}
        end repeat
        if startupDisk is not "DiskA:" then return
        -- do other stuff here applicable only to main startup disk
end tell

This works for me, but Dave's suggestion would also work well.

Dan Lester 01-04-2018 11:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by billearl (Post 34094)
Here's a portion of my startup script. The script is saved as an app (I call it "Startup Actions"), and added to the Login Items list. The icon of the startup disk always appears at the top of the screen.

Nice idea. Thank you. But as I said, the simplest thing might just be to get in the habit of checking the "Startup Disk" whenever I am unexpectedly confronted with a login window. That happens very rarely.

Of course, if the internal disk dies while I'm logged in, without a power-failure reboot, it will end up being a manual decision to restart and boot to a clone.


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