Deleting folders on Time Machine backup disk

How do I delete certain folders on the TM backup disk? There seems to be a tool in time machine to do that, but it doesn't seem to work.
I've tried choosing a folder (safari cache ~/Library/Caches/Safari), then selecting tools/delete all backups of "Safari". Then nothing happens. It asks me to confirm the delete but it doesn't do anything else. No disk activity. No freed space on the backup disk. The folder remains there even though I close time machine and re-enter it.
The folder is currently excluded from Time machine backups but I'd like to get rid of the old crap in there.
/hv

~/Library/Caches is not backed up by TM so there is nothing to delete there.
To see the list of things that TM never backs up Quciklook
/System/Library/CoreServices/backupd.bundle/Contents/Resources/StdExclusions.pli st

Similar Messages

  • How do I get back iphone app information from a DELETED Time Machine Backup disk

    Hi People,
    here is what happened:
    I have been using an iPhone App (Audio Memos Free - The Voice Recorder) to record song ideas (I am a songwriter). I have been using it for years.
    I backed up my iphone to itunes, and backed up my mac on Time Machine. After a month or so I did a fresh OSX install on my mac, copied all of my files back from Time Machine into my mac, and tried to set up Time Machine. I was not able to do so, so I had to format the Time Machine Backup disk and doing a "fresh" mac Time Machine Backup.
    After a week or so, my iphone asks me something like "you do not possess the rights for one or more applications". do not know what i did, but after 1 minute my iPhone was wiped out of all my apps and app contents. I had also the icloud app sync, so i did not worry, recovered from icloud notes, contacts, and all other things. so i did another backup to itunes.
    Now i discover icloud did not recover or save the "Audio Memos Free" app content. I know the data are hidden into the Time machine Backup HD, but i do not know where to search for the itunes backup in it.
    I know it is in library, but library won't show up.
    Any help would be much appreciated.
    PS there is a chance that, even without a data recovery, my latest itunes backup was containing these songs, but i do not know how to fish that out of the Time machine drive.
    Thank you in advance.

    I would email iTunes Customer Service:
    http://www.apple.com/support/itunes/store/browser/
    CG

  • How do I manually erase my Time Machine backup disk?

    I have a 500GB external hard drive with only 43 GB left after years of serving as a Time Machine backup disk for another computer. I wanted to use the same disk for my new computer. The new computer's backup is 130 GB, and when I connected the old external drive, Time Machine said "The backup disk needs to be 130.37 GB for the backup but only 47.24 GB are available. Select a larger backup disk or make the backup smaller by excluding files." So I manually deleted the files I found on the external drive onto my computer's trash.
    Big mistake. Apparently, there are still only 47.24 GB on the external, but there are no apparent backups or files on it. Furthermore, I can't restore the deleted files to the external hard drive because there isn't enough space on it. Too late, I did some searching and discovered that you can't delete files from a Time Machine external drive manually; you can only go through the gear icon in Finder and remove backups in that way.
    So why does my external drive say that it has only 47 GB out of 500 even when there is nothing on it? Is there any other way to manually erase/reformat it?

    Try opening Disk Utility and select the highest level drive name on the external drive. Click on the Partitions tab. Remove all the partitions on the drive by selecting each and clicking the "-" sign in the lower left corner of the partition table view. Then choose 1 Partition from the dropdown of partitions to create. Make sure the format shows Mac OS Extended-Journaled. Click Apply.
    The above should delete everything on the drive and create a new single formated partition.

  • How do I create more space on Time Machine backup disk?

    How do I create more space on Time Machine backup disk?

    since time machine in Snow Leopard stops backing up when there's no more space on the disk,
    That is has not been my experience, and does not appear to be agree with this Time Machine documentation:
    Backup drive fills up
    As your backup drive begins to fill up to its capacity, Time Machine intelligently deletes the oldest backups to make room for newer ones (and will alert you if the "Notify after old backups are deleted" option is selected in Time Machine preferences).
    from : Mac 101: Time Machine

  • Cannot restore some files/folders from Time Machine Backup

    When I try and restore files or folders from my Pictures folder, which is a sub folder of my user I get the message "The operation can’t be completed because you don’t have permission to access xxxx". As far as I can tell this has only just started to happen because I've recovered stuff from the folder since I bought the machine in July. Yesterday I deleted an old Time Machine backup folder from the Time Machine disc. This caused empty trash to go berserk - the "files to delete" count went negative and I had to stop/restart the empty trash command about 20 times before it sorted itself out. Maybe this has screwed some permissions somewhere? I have run disc utility and repaied permissions on my hard drive and verified the TM drive. Still no joy. The permissions for Pictures look OK. Anyone any ideas?

    Yesterday I deleted an old Time Machine backup folder from the Time Machine disc. This caused empty trash to go berserk - the "files to delete" count went negative
    Probably you corrupted your Time Machine Backup by manually deleting older backups- that is dangerous.
    See Pondni's advice on how to fix it - Time Machine trouble Shooting
    I hope that helps
    Léonie

  • HT201250 My MacBook Pro (using OSX 10.7.5) suddenly can't find the Time Machine backup disk, which is on the harddrive of my desktop iMac. What to do?

    My MacBook Pro (using OSX 10.7.5) suddenly can't find the Time Machine backup disk, which is on the harddrive of my desktop iMac. What to do?

    Inherit a Backup
    Inherit a Backup (2)

  • Restored system from Time Machine backup disk but the system could not start-up

    On MacBook Pro early 2008, restored the entire system from Time Machine backup disk to the entire disk.
    The previous system on the backup disk had FileVault turned on.
    The restore completed successfully and I was prompted to restart the system via the new restored system disk.
    I heard the normal start-up sound, then the Apple logo, but it stuck at the logo screen. And the cooling fan run at almost full speed?
    I have been waiting for a few hours, guessing it might FileVault the disk.
    Finally I have to shutdown the machine as it stuck at the logo screen forever.
    Anyone has the same issue? Any ideas?

    BTW, I also tried Repair the system disk, Fix permissions via Disk Utility.
    I guess I must lose some files either during the backup or the restore.

  • Time Machine Backup Disk Cannot be found

    While my iMac was in sleep mode, I disconnected the power to my external, firewire time machine backup disk. The backup is a Western Digital hard drive.
    Now I get the error message "Your Time Machine Backup Disk Cannot be Found"
    I have rebooted the computer with the disk connected and the disk still doesn't show up on the desktop.
    I rebooted the computer with the disk powered up but the firewire disconnected, then connected the firewire. The disk still doesn't appear on the desktop.
    I tried Disk Warrior, and Disk Warrior doesn't see the external Time Machine disk.
    What to do?

    Dan Mackey1 wrote:
    While my iMac was in sleep mode, I disconnected the power to my external, firewire time machine backup disk. The backup is a Western Digital hard drive.
    That might corrupt your backups, but shouldn't make the disk completely un-usable.
    Disconnect it and power it off for several minutes, turn Time Machine OFF, then Restart your Mac again. Let your Mac get powered-up and running before connecting and powering the disk on. Then see if Disk Utility can see it.
    Is this a dual-mode disk? If so, try connecting via USB -- it may work that way.
    Can you tell if it's running? Is it one with a light, and/or can you hear it run or feel it vibrating?

  • Error Dialogue: "Time Machine Backup Disk Can't be Found"

    Hello -
    I am trying to "Enter Time Machine" (which is on a Time Capsule); but when I try this, I am met by the error message "Your Time Machine Backup Disk Can't be Found" with the option given to "Set up My Time Machine".
    Needless to say, my Time Machine has been set up for months. When I look in the preferences, it clearly shows the disk I'm connected to (here's a screenshot of the error dialogue alongside my Time Machine preferences: http://cl.ly/1HGk).
    Any idea what the best course of action is here.
    ADDITIONAL NOTE: notice from the screenshot that Time Machine thinks the earliest backup is only 1 day prior. This is also strange as I have said I've had Time Machine working on this Time Capsule for months. I called Apple about this and was told that a software update had gone out yesterday that reformatted the drives and started the backups all over again. While completely fishy - I don't remember agreeing to any software update dialogue about erasing my Time Capsule - I took them at their word. Not sure if this is related, but thought I should mention it.
    Thanks Crew!

    MattLat wrote:
    Hello -
    I am trying to "Enter Time Machine" (which is on a Time Capsule); but when I try this, I am met by the error message "Your Time Machine Backup Disk Can't be Found" with the option given to "Set up My Time Machine".
    Needless to say, my Time Machine has been set up for months. When I look in the preferences, it clearly shows the disk I'm connected to (here's a screenshot of the error dialogue alongside my Time Machine preferences: http://cl.ly/1HGk).
    Any idea what the best course of action is here.
    The +sparse bundle+ containing your backups may be corrupted. Repair it, per #A5 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of the +Time Machine+ forum).
    If that doesn't help, try a "full reset" of Time Machine, per #A4 there.
    ADDITIONAL NOTE: notice from the screenshot that Time Machine thinks the earliest backup is only 1 day prior. This is also strange as I have said I've had Time Machine working on this Time Capsule for months. I called Apple about this and was told that a software update had gone out yesterday that reformatted the drives and started the backups all over again.
    That's the first I've heard of that. They may have been referring to the +Time Capsule Backup Update 1.0+ update several weeks ago, that some folks got but others didn't. If it finds a problem, it sends the message in this article: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4076 The existing sparse bundle is renamed and locked, and a new one made.

  • Migration Assistant won't see my Time machine backup disk

    Hi,
    I've seen some other discussions but they apply to slightly different situations and turn out to be too complex for me to follow.  My situation is this.  My Dec 2008 Macbook running Lion just died.  Not sure what the problem is but it seems to be the hardrive.  It will take me a while to get it fixed and in the meantime I have a farly new mac mini running Lion.
    I also have been making Time Machine backups to an external drive.  I read that I could migrate content from a time machine backup and I connected the backup to my mac mini and launched Migration Assistan (MA), seleted the option to migrate from a Time Machine backup.  MA is stuck trying to find my disk even though it shows up in Finder.  This is the screen I'm talking about http://screencast.com/t/AC0OiVzxx
    I'm hoping there is the equivalent of a little on/off switch that I'm not seeing and you can direct me too. 
    How can I get MA to see my Time Machine backup disk?  Thanks for your help.

    sorry, i don't know what else it could be then. if you have another external drive you can try doing a full system restore from the TM backups onto that drive and see if MA will recognize that drive and migrate from it. other than this there is always manual migration. slow and tedious but it can be done. see this link for help with that
    http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=6185507

  • Verify Disk failed for Time Machine backup disk

    Thread <http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?messageID=7930301&#7930301> discussed a similar issue, but it was closed without an answer so I'm opening a new one.
    After a power failure I ran Disk Utility to Repair Permissions on my boot disk and Verify Disk on another that I use to store media files; neither had significant problems. Then I ran Verify Disk (verify, not repair; and disk, not permissions) on my Time Machine backup disk. It started spitting out the errors shown below. The time remaining counted up to 16 minutes, but wasn't coming down very fast so I left it running overnight. My machine is set to not sleep or spin down the disks. The next evening it was down to 12 minutes left, and was still spitting out the same errors. The second evening it was done, having failed out as shown in this log file excerpt:
    2009-06-20 22:25:48 -0400: Verifying volume “Backup”
    Starting verification tool: 2009-06-20 22:25:48 -0400
    2009-06-20 22:25:50 -0400: Checking Journaled HFS Plus volume.
    2009-06-20 22:25:50 -0400: Checking Extents Overflow file.
    2009-06-20 22:25:50 -0400: Checking Catalog file.
    2009-06-20 22:35:21 -0400: Checking multi-linked files.
    2009-06-20 23:08:17 -0400: Checking Catalog hierarchy.
    2009-06-20 23:16:59 -0400: Checking Extended Attributes file.
    2009-06-20 23:18:34 -0400: Checking multi-linked directories.
    2009-06-20 23:31:05 -0400: 2009-06-20 23:31:05 -0400: Incorrect owner flags for directory hard link (id = 3763501)
    2009-06-20 23:31:05 -0400: 2009-06-20 23:31:05 -0400: 2009-06-20 23:31:05 -0400: (It should be 0x2 instead of 0x0)
    2009-06-22 15:14:54 -0400: 2009-06-22 15:14:57 -0400: Incorrect owner flags for directory hard link (id = 7746623)
    2009-06-22 15:14:59 -0400: 2009-06-22 15:15:00 -0400: 2009-06-22 15:15:02 -0400: (It should be 0x2 instead of 0x0)
    2009-06-22 15:20:35 -0400: Checking volume bitmap.
    2009-06-22 15:20:37 -0400: Checking volume information.
    2009-06-22 15:20:39 -0400: 2009-06-22 15:20:41 -0400: The volume Backup needs to be repaired.
    2009-06-22 15:20:43 -0400: Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.2009-06-22 15:20:44 -0400:
    2009-06-22 15:20:44 -0400: Disk Utility stopped verifying “Backup” because the following error was encountered:
    Filesystem verify or repair failed.
    At that point the whole system was extremely sluggish, and the access light on the backup disk was flashing steadily. The pmTool process seemed to be running away, but the system wasn't responsive enough for me to do much about it, so I held down the power button to shutdown. Upon the 2nd restart the system booted and seems to be OK, but I'm leery of running another Verify Disk.
    What's going on? Are those errors anything to worry about? Is it possible to run Verify Disk on a Time Machine backup disk? What about Repair Disk?

    John Seal wrote:
    2009-06-22 15:20:43 -0400: Error: Filesystem verify or repair failed.2009-06-22 15:20:44 -0400:
    2009-06-22 15:20:44 -0400: Disk Utility stopped verifying “Backup” because the following error was encountered:
    Filesystem verify or repair failed.
    At that point the whole system was extremely sluggish, and the access light on the backup disk was flashing steadily. The pmTool process seemed to be running away, but the system wasn't responsive enough for me to do much about it, so I held down the power button to shutdown.
    Any time Disk Utility says you need to repair a disk, you need to repair it. Period.
    So run it. If it fails to repair everything, run it again (and again) until it either repairs everything or can't repair any more. If it can't repair it, post back and we'll discuss options.
    There's no point in running +Verify Disk+ on an external drive; just run +Repair Disk.+ The only time +Verify Disk+ is needed is for your internal HD (because you can't repair the disk you're running from).
    And you need to do that again because of the forced power-down. Any time there's an abnormal shutdown, it's possible the file system on your internal HD can be damaged. Usually it isn't, but it's possible. If that says you need to repair it, you'll have to boot from your Leopard Install disc and use it's copy of DU. Post back if you need to do this but don't know how.

  • I need to backup my mails from a time machine backup disk from a powerbook leopard to an IMac snow Leopard...can I do this?

    Hi everybody...
    I need to backup my complete history of emails. I have a time machine backup disk I used in a powerbook intel, second generation with Leopard OS. Now I have an Imac of 24 inches, with Snow Leopard OS. Can I use that backup disk (TM) to put the mails that used to be in the powerbook into my IMac?
    My original powerbook is broken, so I cant do anything there...

    You should be able to find and restore emails that were on the old Mac via Time Machine.  Emails that were on the server, not the Mac, won't be there, of course.
    See the blue box in #15 of  Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions.

  • Can't connect to a Time Machine backup disk

    I have erased my TM via Airport Utility
    AirPort Utility 6.x: Erase an AirPort Time Capsule disk
    So far so good...But now, I am unable to open TM, when I do it opens momentarily, then closes with message "Can't conect to a Time Machine backup disk".
    I have turned off TM as I do not want to use the TM as backup..I want to use it as an EHD and transfer data to the disk manually (not by automatic TM backups).
    How can I do this?

    No. It is not in Finder at all..only I can see the Airport Capusle (on the left side) under "Shared"...but this does not allow for any data transfer.
    It should show under "Devices", and allow for data transfer....don't know how to fix this one..

  • Time Machine "Backup Disk Not Available" over WAN

    I have port forwarded port 46 (TCP and UDP) to port 548 a Mac mini server running Mac OS X 10.6.8, and I have Time Machine backup disk on it set as a share point with Time Machine support enabled. On my Mac Pro running OS X 10.8.5, I am able to connect via AFP to my server with the address "afp://my-ip-address:46" and can read and write on the backup disk share point. I tested that, and it works. When I am on the same LAN as the server, I can use that disk for Time Machine and have been doing so for years. However, I cannot do a Time Machine backup to that share point over the WAN. When I open Time Machine preferences, I can select the share point as my backup disk, but once I start the backup, it says "Backup disk not available" and fails to start. How could I fix this problem?
    In case you're wondering, I forward port 46 to port 548 instead of port 548 to port 548 to minimize hacking attempts. Last time I used a default port, a computer in Taiwan started spamming SSH authentication failures.

    I did find this article via Google
    <http://www.macgurulounge.com/make-time-machine-remotely-back-up-to-your-time-cap sule/>
    Personally, I use CrashPlan (free option using my own disks) to backup over the internet.  It works very well when I'm away from home.  Everything is encrypted.

  • Time Machine Backup Disk Encryption Password

    I use a partitioned external drive to backup my stuff. Had enabled encryption option for the Time Machine backup disk and forgot the same. Can not find an entry in Keychain, any inputs on how to retrieve the password or unlock the particular partition?

    Thanks for your reply. Call me stupid, but I had set-up the encryption in August and didn't use the back-up since then. Even though hint is visible, it doesn't help.

Maybe you are looking for