HT201250 finding "invisibles" in Time Machine

I need to restore Macromedia data (else my 20+ hours of gameplay are for naught). How do I do that, given that the containing folders are invisible?

Enable Finder to Show Invisible Files and Folders
Open the Terminal application in your Utilities folder. At the prompt enter or paste the following command line then press RETURN.
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
killall Finder
To turn off the display of invisible files and folders enter or paste the following command line and press RETURN.
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles FALSE
killall Finder
Alternatively you can use one of the numerous third-party utilities such as TinkerTool or ShowHideInvisibleFiles - VersionTracker or MacUpdate.

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HT201250 I accidentally deleted an important note on my iPhone. Can I find it in Time Machine?

I accidently deleted an important note on my iphone. Can I find it on Time Machine?

If you have Time Machine connected you should be able to.
VK replied to a similar question here ...
Start Mail and open the Notes mailbox. click on TM in the dock, scroll back in time in the Mail window, select the note you deleted and hit 'restore".

Genius Bar lost a business file. Can't seem to find it in Time Machine...Got Ideas?

Genius Bar lost a business financial file. Can't seem to find it in Time Machine. Gone back several days...Got Ideas?

You need to give me more info..
What did you take the Mac to the genius for??
What did they do to it?
Did you have TM setup at defaults doing backups hourly?
Are you using a Time Capsule? Did you ever backup the time capsule??
Please do a backup of your Time Machine backup right now.. in TC plug in a suitable sized USB drive and do an archive.. you can do nothing else while this is happening but it is crucial for you to have another copy of whatever you have.
Archive is a bit slow.. and the backup is slightly less useful.
The fastest method is plug the USB into your computer and copy and paste the backups.backupdb directly to the USB drive. It should copy at around 60GB/hr so calculate how long that will take. See instructions here. http://pondini.org/TM/18.html Assuming you are using a TC then you use method 4.. copying from a Network backup to local drive.
Never work directly from the original backup .. work just from this copy so anything you do can be reversed or recovered.
Read very carefully the methods of restoring files from TM.. it is a bit out of date but Pondini has the best details.
So Q14-17 here. http://pondini.org/TM/FAQ.html
You can do a full recovery of the backup to a USB drive.. and then search for your file in more normal way.
Get professional help.. and this is where you need data recovery people who are familiar with apple TM backup format. Check local apple store or perhaps better local Apple independent repair business that are used to handling this kind of event.
Also talk to the company that makes the software as they must have to deal with people who manage to lose, corrupt or in some other way ruin their data and need to recover.. see what hints they can give you.
Surely at some point you pass your info to your accountant in the form of a computer backup file from your accounting package.
I have to admit I am surprised if you never backed up your business data file to a USB stick and put it in a filing cabinet at home or a hard disk at a friends place.. Cloud storage for your business files.. Did you depend totally on TM for backups? You never planned for a fire or theft of your computer and TC?? Or what has happened.. loss of computer files and failure of the backup? No greater teacher than the burnt hand that touching hot stuff isn't a good idea. Sorry .. it is a very hard lesson.. but electronic data storage on magnetic media is ever one byte away from being gone forever.. !!

Normal delay to display past files via Finder interface in Time Machine?

I have a Time Capsule as router running my gigabit network and as a Time Machine backup device. When I want to retrieve a file from the past via the Finder interface to Time Machine, I hear a lot of noise from my Time Capsule (about 6 feet away), and more importantly, there are long delays (at least 10-15 seconds) in getting a response from the date scale on the right side of the screen (i.e. being able to click on a different date) and in displaying the contents of the folder at a new date in time.
Are such delays to be expected? Is there anything I can do to speed things up?

Well personally I've had basically no problems with Time Machine and the Time Capsule. But looking at these discussions there are certainly a lot of people with: endless preparing, endless backing up, endless finishing, hanging the system, knocking down internet when backing up, unable to mount, unable to find backup, unable to find TC, unable to copy, .........
Sure in some instances some of these can be worked around fairly easily, but I perceive some fairly serious flaws both in implementation and in documentation.
As I see it far more time is spent backing up than restoring, for me I'm not disturbed by the delays....

I have just started using Time Machine. I was thinking about deleting old E-Mails on my Mac to clean. Does Time Machine back up the E-Mails , if so how can I find them in Time Machine ??

I have just started using Time Machine. I was thinking about deleting old E-Mails on my Mac to clean. Does Time Machine back up the E-Mails , if so how can I find them in Time Machine ??

If you back up your mac before deleting your emails, Time Machine should back up your e-mails.
I never tried this so i'm not sure to find them in Time Machine. To browse in your backups simply click the Time Machine icon in your dock. In the right bar, you can select an backup. Than you can browse in finder, in your backkup.
EDIT: Just browsed and CT above was right. This topic might help you:
https://discussions.apple.com/message/20154303#20154303

I accidentally erased a sticky from my Dashboard? I don't know how to find them in Time Machine.

I accidentally erased a sticky from my Dashboard? I don't know how to find them in Time Machine. Any ideas how to recover it?

When you have a Write window open press F9 to turn on the Contact Sidebar. Select the contact or contacts to send to. Hold the control key while clicking contacts to select more than one. Then use one of the Add To buttons at the bottom.
This looks like the first message you have posted here. You will get an email to the address you used when registering.
You can click on your username to go to your profile/activity page. I suggest that you bookmark that so you can find your posts and answers easily.

TS1211 I lost one calendar from my Mac Osx 10.5.8 system on G4 how can I find it from time machine backup?

I lost one calendar from my Mac Osx 10.5.8 system on G4 how can I find it from time machine backup?
Can someone help me with that pls !!!!!!

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5176639

HT201250 can't find item lost on hard drive, can i find it on time machine ?

i have lost a spreadsheet. how can i locate it on my time machine backup disk?

Enter your time machine backup (from the TM menu) and search for the item in there - then restore the most recent version of it.

HT201250 Once I use time machine to back up my Mac Air, can I delete all my files from HD and still have access to them on TM (external hard disk)?

New to Time Machine. The HD on my Mac Air is full so I got an external HD and using TM to back up everything.
Can I erase all files (pictures, docs, etc) from my Mac and still have access to those files through Time Machine?

That is a bad idea. Time Machine is strictly a backup utility. What you describe will require archiving files, which Time Machine is not designed to accomplish.
Once you erase files from your MacBook Air, they will eventually be erased from your Time Machine backup. This is by design, as Time Machine will eventually fill your backup volume and will delete old files as required. Depending on when they were first backed up and how long they existed on your MBA before you erase them, they could disappear in as little as one hour.
Use Carbon Copy Cloner or equivalent "clone" utility and configure it to archive files that do not exist on the source, or simply copy them over manually using the Finder. You can then delete them from your MBA. Bear in mind that once you do that, you no longer have a backup copy. The only copies will exist on the external HD.

HT201250 How to change Time Machine back up time

Is there a way to change the hourly Time Machine back up time to once or twice a day?

Tidy wrote:
Now I have my original back up on time capsule which time machine can't see and it keeps starting over again to make a new backup - so my time capsule disk shows two separate backups one the original one of 2 days ago named for my computer and a new one almost the same gigabytes (139gb) which it has called Macintosh sparse bundle ????
It's possible the first one is damaged, but that seems unlikely, unless you turned the TC or Mac off while it was trying to do a backup. But even that shouldn't cause TM to start a new one (absent any messages to that effect). And it shouldn't be named "Macintosh" unless you've changed your computer name to that via System Prefs > Sharing.
A clue may be lurking in your logs. Use the widget in #A1 of Time Machine - Troubleshooting to display the backup messages from your logs. Locate both backups in question, then copy and post all the messages for each one here. (Since the first backup has been a couple of days, the widget may not show the messages for that backup; if not, the pink box shows how to use the Console app to find them.)
With the messages from both backups, we may be able to see what's going on.
I'm thinking that I should just leave time cap ON and see which it backs up to then delete the other one.
Let's see what we can find first.
I assume connecting iMac to time cap via Ethernet cable would not be a problem?
Correct. Doing the first, full backup via Ethernet is recommended.
Also if just turning time machine off is enough to disrupt time capsule backups how about turning the iMac off, which I will have to do once in a while.
Neither should be a problem, unless a backup is in progress and either the TC or Mac is shut down abnormally.

After i had my hard drive replaced, i've gone to get my old emails and am unable to find them on time machine. The file com.apple.mail.plist isn't there. HELP!

Pretty sure this will be some sort of user error, but i'm lost.
I had to have my hard drive replaced, so before taking it to the genius bar, i backed up using time machine. I'd had issues with trying to use Carbon Copy Cloner previously so had formatted the external drive before doing time machine. TM seemed to work fine and copied what looked to be everything. Once i'd got the new hard drive in and went to restore everything, when i looked for the file i need to get to apparently get my mails back (Library > Preferences > com.apple.mail.plist) it's not there.
Any help would be MASSIVELY appreciated.
J

Turn Time Machine OFF temporarily in its preference pane. Leave the window open.
Navigate in the Finder to your backup disk, and then to the folder named "Backups.backupdb" at the top level of the volume. If you back up over a network, you'll first have to mount the disk image file containing your backups by double-clicking it. Descend into the folder until you see the snapshots, which are represented by folders with a name that begins with the date of the snapshot. Find the one you want to restore from. There's a link named "Latest" representing the most recent snapshot. Use that one, if possible. Otherwise, you'll have to remember the date of the snapshot you choose.
Inside the snapshot folder is a folder hierarchy like the one on the source disk. Find one of the items you can't restore and select it. Open the Info dialog for the selected item. In the Sharing & Permissions section, you may see an entry in the access list that shows "Fetching…" in the Name column. If so, click the lock icon in the lower right corner of the dialog and authenticate. Then delete the "Fetching…" item from the icon list. Click the gear icon below the list and select Apply to enclosed items from the popup menu.
Now you should be able either to copy the item in the Finder or to restore it in the time-travel view. If you use the time-travel view, be sure to select the snapshot you just modified. If successful, repeat the operation with the other items you were unable to restore. You can select multiple items in the Finder and open a single Info dialog for all of them by pressing the key combination option-command-I.
When you're done, turn TM back ON and close its preference pane.

My History became cleared after a power-cut - can I find it in Time Machine ?

Normally, after a forced quit, Firefox restores all open websites. After a power-cut, this did NOT happen ... when I looked in History I found it completely empty (although I did not clear it).
I have Time Machine on my Mac ... but where do I look to restore the History ?

How have you searched in Time Machine?
If you can't recover them from there, the you'll need a file recovery application like File Salvage
Note that you won't be able to recover the Library the best you can hope is to recover the photos. The can by the file recovery software may find many files with the same name. In all cases choose to recover the largest file.
Regards
TD

Find files on Time Machine that weren't in the "Latest Backup"?

I restored my new Mac with the "Latest Backup" of Time Machine. I now understand that I will have to erase the whole backup harddrive in order to continue using Time Machine (I cannot get it to do incremental backups with my new computer from where I left off on the old one).
Since I deleted some files from my old computer after early backups, I presume they wouldn't be on my new computer because I backed up from the "Latest Backup", correct?
Is there any way that I can find out which files I have backed up someplace on my harddrive that are not on my computer now? That way I would be able to locate and transfer them all into a temporary folder on my computer, erase my external harddrive, do a fresh backup of everything on my computer, then I could delete that temporary folder once everything is done. That way I still won't have those files on my computer, but I will have them backed up.
Does this make sense?
Thanks a lot

Bergers wrote:
I restored my new Mac with the "Latest Backup" of Time Machine. I now understand that I will have to erase the whole backup harddrive in order to continue using Time Machine (I cannot get it to do incremental backups with my new computer from where I left off on the old one).
You may be able to get the new Mac to "inherit" the old one's backups manually. See #B6 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.
But the practice of deleting originals, assuming Time Machine will keep the backups indefinitely, is a major mistake. See Time Machine - Frequently Asked Question #20.
Linc is correct about multiple backups -- it's always prudent. See #27 in the FAQ link for some suggestions.

Spotlight not finding files in time machine

I Have this problem where spolight is not finding the files present on my back-up drive using time machine. The files are there, I can find them manually but when searching for the using spotlight, 0 results show up. Does anyone have any exeprience with this?

The correct search method is to do a Smart Folder search and then enter Time Machine with that as the active window. Of course this searches separately in every backup. You can't, for instance (at least so far as I know), do a global search to tell you which backup a particular file is present in (wouldn't be all that clear what you were finding anyway since similarly named files or folders in different backups might have different contents).
Is this what you were doing?

Multiple "Backup of ..." Entries In Finder / Related to Time Machine

I currently have 17 items under "Devices" in the Finder which are labeled "Backup of System". It seems like each time Time Machine performed a backup (or perhaps failed?), another entry was added. The list has grown over time, although I can't seem to figure out when it occurs.
Anyhow, when a Time Machine backup begins, near the top of the "Devices" list, an entry called "Backup of System" appears with the appropriate spinning animation showing that the backup is in progress. The 17 other entries will each have an eject/unmount button next to them, but nothing happens when the buttons are clicked. As soon as the backup is complete, the eject buttons go away. Clicking on the just flashes the contents of the finder, and doesn't change to any particular folder.
Why is this happening? I'd love to send along a screenshot. It looks like I'm going to have to reboot to get rid of these, since there seems to be no way to remove them manually.
I run PathFinder on this system, and for some reason, these entries do not appear under PathFinder ... only in Finder.
Any suggestions?

Nimiety wrote:
I have the same issue. It is directly related to time machine.
If you notice carefully, each time time machine goes to do it's routine backup, it creates a temporary filesystem under devices. What seems to happen is these filesystems don't get properly cleaned out after TM is done. I suspect it may have something to do with capacity on the receiving device (I have a 1TB time capsule that is nearly full).
It is annoying, and I'd love to see it addressed.
Contact Apple's Canada technical support: (800) 263-3394
Have all your particulars handy, including the serial numbers of both your Mac and Time Capsule, the version of OSX and Airport, etc.
When you get an answer, be sure to post it here so others can benefit.

HT201250 finding "invisibles" in Time Machine

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