How do I get contacts list backed up in time machine?

I cant seem to get my contacts backed up into the time machine, how do i get this to happen automatically?

Hi Peter and a warm welcome to Discussions!
RedPeter505 wrote:
is TM deleting files that have only been on my computer short term?
TM is designed to delete files. Seems conterproductive for a backup application but then again TM is not designed to be an ordinary backup solution that you can rely upon it to keep your files until you as the user decides to delete backups because you find that they are unnecessary. Incidentally, note that the TM preferences tick box says "Warn when old backups are deleted" not "are about to be deleted". There may be warnings before deletion but in my experience one can't count on that.
I can't say why those files are no longer on your backup. Download the Time Machine widget and have a look if there's anything in the TM log for the relevant time the files disappeared. TM shouldn't delete when there's a lot of space left on the drive. However, unfortunately it does happen that TM loses track of what has been backed up and so begins a full backup to ensure all's backed up. In such a case and where the full backup is big, it may have deleted the oldest files to make space for the new backup. Ironic.
If so, how long do I need to keep files on my computer to ensure that TM keeps them for good? I believe TM deletes a lot of weekly and monthly back ups after a month, but this seems to put a lot of 'short term stay' files in danger of being lost completely. Am I right in assuming this?
You can't (afaik) ensure that TM will forever keep files that it has copied because of how TM is designed. If you want a proper/ordinary backup solution look elsewhere. Because of TM's design, I actually stopped using it and instead set up SuperDuper to run a daily backup of the drive where I save all my stuff. Sure, I won't have the extra security that TM offers by backing up every hour (thus minimising the amount of data that may be lost while working on a file) but I don't need that because I am very careful to save regularly.
/p

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