Scheduling not working

[Michael@wengam]

[FYI (edit): problem solved by Yosemite upgrade, although it is a mystery why -- MW 10/19/2014]

My Scheduled copies are not running, since around the time of v2.7.2, which also coincided with me upgrading this Mac Pro 2008 to Mavericks 10.9.2. I'm a bit vague about when and which schedules have been missed--I run daily, weekly and monthly copies to 3 different disks. I got out of the habit of checking SD! because it was so regular, but when I closely monitor a new schedule it seems maybe all automatic schedules have been missed.

I did delete all my existing schedules (3) and recreate them after 2.7.2. I'm at a loss to know how to trouble shoot this further.

I can have SD! open, with a newly-created copy scheduled, and watch the clock go by the scheduled start time with no response. If I close and open the Scheduled Copies window, on re-opening it, it correctly updates the time of the Next Copy to the next occasion after the event that was missed. Because the run did not happen, there is no log to show and I found no messages in Console logs that coincided with the missed schedule.

[dnanian]

Well, that's certainly weird. I haven't heard of anyone else having it not work at all like that, even while watching.

It hasn't ever run since 2.7.2? Ever?

[Michael@wengam]

Well, I have not been paying attention closely until recently, but yes I don't think I have ever seen a date entered under 'Last Copy' since around the time I moved to Mavericks and 2.7.2 in February.

Using CronniX, the crontab entry for my daily scheduled sync is:

/Users/michael/Library/Application\ Support/SuperDuper\!/Scheduled\ Copies/SDUtil -i || open file:///Users/michael/Library/Application\%20Support/SuperDuper\%21/Scheduled\%20Copies/Smart\%20Update\%20Daily_OSX_metal\%20from\%20OSX_ metal.sdsp/Copy\%20Job.app

In Cronnix, choosing 'Task/Run Now' also results in no response by SD! even when it is open.

[Edit: just to add, I am running the backup manually by clicking the 'Copy Now' button in the scheduling panel, and that works OK]

[dnanian]

That's because SDUtil, in the crontab, is always going to say "don't run": the real launch is done from launchd.

So, do you see our backup by time launch agent in ~/Library/LaunchAgents?

[Michael@wengam]

Yes, I see that launch agent in the LaunchAgents folder, and I have pasted its contents below. The Backup by Time.scpt file that it references is dated Feb 22, 2014, which would be about the last time I remember having reliable operation.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>Label</key>
<string>com.shirtpocket.backupbytime</string>
<key>LimitLoadToSessionType</key>
<string>Aqua</string>
<key>ProgramArguments</key>
<array>
<string>osascript</string>
<string>/Users/michael/Library/Application Support/SuperDuper!/Scheduled Copies/Backup by Time.scpt</string>
</array>
<key>RunAtLoad</key>
<true/>
<key>StartInterval</key>
<integer>60</integer>
</dict>
</plist>

[dnanian]

Do you see anything in the console/system log ("all messages") if you set it to run a few minutes from "now" and then wait to see what happens?

[Michael@wengam]

I've attached an hour of my All Messages from Console, spanning a scheduled SD! run set for 8:42 AM.

[dnanian]

Well, I'm seeing a bunch of stuff here that doesn't seem related, but

5/9/14 9:35:00.833 AM System Events[18976] .sdef warning for part of complex type 'any | number | boolean | date | list | record | text | data' used in suite 'Property List Suite': 'data' is not a valid type name.
5/9/14 9:35:00.834 AM System Events[18976] .sdef warning for type 'text | missing value | any' attribute 'uniqueID' of class 'XML element' in suite 'XML Suite': AppleScript ID references may not work for this property because its type is not NSNumber- or NSString-derived.

is weird. I can't tell if that's coming from us or not (I don't think so, because it's not happening every minute.)

I think we're getting to the point where having this kind of investigation in the forums isn't terribly productive. Send me an email to support and we'll go deeper there (that way we won't end up accidentally posting your system information more deeply here).

[Michael@wengam]

Just to give an update on this, the problem finally went away when I upgraded to Yosemite OS X 10.10

Schedules now appear to be running again as normal.

For me, the problem occured during a period almost exactly coinciding with running Mavericks (OS X 10.9).