Time Machine Not Saving certain files

I'm having a recurring problem with Time Machine. It will decide that it isn't going to save certain files or folders. I get this sort of a message;
Error: (-36) SrcErr:NO Copying /Users/Documents
Error: (-8062) SrcErr:NO Copying /Users//Documents
The disc permissions are all fine and there's no real reason this should happen.
The only thing I can see that separates these items from any other is that they all state in their Info that I have custom access. Sometimes this will show up as an unknown grayed out user that I can't change, or just a custom access setting.
Any ideas ?

I am having the same problems. I have done all the recommended fixes from the Troubleshooting. I have run disk utility repair on the external hard drives and a verify on the internal drive. I have reformattted the external hard drive. I have done a full reset on the backup drive. I have excluded it from virus scans. I have set the energy saver to keep the drives running. But I keep getting this message (below). I got it on a file higher in the directory and I deleted that file and now it trips on the next file down. The process that I am trying to do is back up one external drive to another.
Starting standard backup
Backing up to: /Volumes/Big Bubba Bear/Backups.backupdb
Node requires deep traversal:/Volumes/Sugar Bean II reason:must scan subdirs|
No pre-backup thinning needed: 243.89 GB requested (including padding), 425.78 GB available
Waiting for index to be ready (100)
Copied 8 files (93 bytes) from volume Macintosh HD.
Stopping backup.
Error: (-47) SrcErr:YES Copying /Volumes/Sugar Bean II/iTunes/iTunes Music/Rush/A Farewell to Kings/01 A Farewell to Kings.mp3 to (null)
Copied 42580 files (2.5 GB) from volume Sugar Bean II.
Copy stage failed with error:11
Backup failed with error: 11

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Time machine not restoring email file

Using Mountain Lion on MacbookPro. When I try to restore en email, I go through the procedure and hit restore on the selected email in the selected TM backup. TIme Machine reverts to the current Mail as usual but does not create the restored email. Mail screen says Mailbox Not Selected. There is no time machine folder in On My Mac and no recovered files subfolder under that. On my older MacbookPro Time Machine created these and the recovered file shows up there.
Any suggestions?
Thanks

Although you can restore messages from a Time Machine snapshot within the Mail application, it generally won't work with messages that were saved by an older version of Mail. In that case, you have to use an alternative method.
Triple-click the line below to select it:
~/Library/Mail/V2
Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select
Services ▹ Reveal
from the contextual menu. A Finder window should open with a folder selected. Inside that folder are subfolders representing your Mail accounts. The names refer to the email addresses you use. Decide which ones you want to restore messages from.
Enter Time Machine and scroll back to the snapshot you want. Select the account folders you want and then select Restore ... to... from the action menu (gear icon) in the toolbar of the snapshot window. Restore the folders to the Desktop, not to their original location.
From the Mail menu bar, select
File ▹ Import Mailboxes...
Import from the mailboxes in the folders you restored to the Desktop. The imported messages will appear in a new mailbox. Move the ones you want to keep wherever you like and delete the rest. Then delete the folders on the Desktop.

Time Machine not saving all Users

Hi,
I have just used Time Machine for the first time and noticed that it was saving "x" of around 142gb as its first save.
However, I noticed that when I go through the back up history, whilst it saved my wife's account/user files it hasn't saved mine. The icon of my "house" in the Places section doesn't highlight when you scroll over it with the mouse. It does in the "Now" window.. but page through the back up history and it's not saved. My files are also not found in the Users folder.
Any help really appreciated.
Mark

Are you using File Vault?
That's the only reason TM won't save your home folder on each backup. It should, however, save the encrypted disk image when you log out.
If not, start with a Finder window showing your home folder, then go into Time Machine. It should appear that way.
And be sure you're not looking at the first (lowest) window in the "cascade" of the "Star Wars" background; that's the +Today (Now)+ window, representing what's currently on your system. Navigate to the actual backup (behind the Today window) or via the timeline on the right.
You might want to review these:
Time Machine Tutorial
Time Machine 101
How to back up and restore your files
Time Machine Features
Apple - Support - Mac OSX v10.5 Leopard Time Machine
and perhaps browse the Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions *User Tip* at the top of this forum.
If you have a problem setting-up or using Time Machine, start with the Time Machine - Troubleshooting *User Tip* at the top of this forum. It will show you how to locate the message(s) that describe the problem, then help you fix it.

Time Machine not saving snapshots since Lion Upgrade?

I upgraded from SL to Lion a recently and have noticed that Time Machine seems to be behaving diffrently from SL.
I tend to back up to an external USB connected drive every 1 or 2 days.
I've noticed a couple of things...
1) TM in the taskbar usually shows an exclamation mark and says Backup Delayed. This didn't happen under SL wth the same backup frequency
2) Possibly related - if I look in dashboard I see hourly messages stating
Starting standard backup
Error -35 while resolving alias to backup target
Backup failed with error: 19
I assume this is because the external drive isn't permanently connected (it's only for backups) ? I thought TM saved hourly snapshots to my local HD but does this message mean it's trying to backup only to the external drive?
I also get the following quite frequently...
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Deep event scan at path:/ reason:must scan subdirs|new event db|
Finished scan
Having searched around this might be because of the number of backup fails between successful backups?
I've restored a couple of files from older backups and they seem to restore ok so the backups on the external drive seem valid and go back a year.
Is there something wrong with my TM settings ... something I should have changed after going to Lion?
Any help gratefully accepted... it's more of an irritation at present but would hate to find a problem waiting to catch me out when I desperately need to restore!
Cheers
Iain

Iain_IP2 wrote:
1) TM in the taskbar usually shows an exclamation mark and says Backup Delayed. This didn't happen under SL wth the same backup frequency
Yes, Apple changed that. Previously it wouldn't do that until there'd been no backup for 10 days; now it's shown as soon as an hourly backup can't find the destination.
Starting standard backup
Error -35 while resolving alias to backup target
That's normal if the drive isn't connected.
Do backups work properly when it is connected? If so, there isn't a problem.
I thought TM saved hourly snapshots to my local HD
Yes, but those are completely separate from the ones on your TM drive. See #30 in Time Machine - Frequently Asked Questions.
I also get the following quite frequently...
Event store UUIDs don't match for volume: Macintosh HD
Deep event scan at path:/ reason:must scan subdirs|new event db|
Finished scan
Having searched around this might be because of the number of backup fails between successful backups?
You should get those after backups that actually failed (rather than just didn't start), or after an abnormal shutdown or improper disconnection of the external HD.
It means that Time Machine isn't sure whether the previous backup completed successfully; so it must compare everything on your system to the backups.
I'd recommend connecting the drive and letting a backup run. See if it completes normally. Leave the drive connected and either do a backup manually, or wait for the next hourly one, and see if you get those messages again.
You can tell what's going on with recent backups via the widget in #A1 of Time Machine - Troubleshooting.

Time Machine not backing up File Vault encrypted iMac

I recently turned on File Vault and performed backups to my Time Capsule via Time Machine. Although slow it did back up several times. However because of it being slow I followed some advice which said to restart my iMac in Safe Mode and then do a normal restart,which should then speed up the back up process. Well, I did this and it did not make any difference other than now it gets to the end of the back up and starts again, with about completing backup!
So, I'm thinking is it because of File Vault, or is there something else I can do to make sure of being able to perform a backup via Time Machine. I am currently using Lion 10.7.5.
I assume that the backup (if it ever does another one) will also be encrypted as the option in Time Machine to encrypt is greyed out. Any thoughts here?
I thought maybe I should turn File Vault off and try again, but that sort of misses the point if I want to protect my data.
Help please.
Much appreciated - Alani

Alani wrote:
I recently turned on File Vault and performed backups to my Time Capsule via Time Machine. Although slow it did back up several times. However because of it being slow I followed some advice which said to restart my iMac in Safe Mode and then do a normal restart,which should then speed up the back up process. Well, I did this and it did not make any difference other than now it gets to the end of the back up and starts again, with about completing backup!
Does it fail, with a message? If so, what message? If you don't remember, see #C2 in Time Machine - Troubleshooting.
If not, a clue may be lurking in your logs. Use the widget in #A1 of the same link to display the backup messages from your logs. Locate the backup in question, then copy and post all the messages here.
Is it any faster if you connect via an Ethernet cable, instead of wirelessly?
I assume that the backup (if it ever does another one) will also be encrypted as the option in Time Machine to encrypt is greyed out. Any thoughts here?
No. Mountain Lion can encrypt network backups, but Time Machine on Lion can only encrypt backups made to a local or directly-connected external HD.
I thought maybe I should turn File Vault off and try again, but that sort of misses the point if I want to protect my data
No, that will take a very long time and won't make any difference anyway.

Time Machine Not Recognizing Some files as Changed ... Until I Restart

Yesterday I upgraded the HD in my Macbook Pro, and I used Time Machine to restore my stuff to the new drive. Worked like a charm, except...
First bit of strangeness: I noticed that Time Machine hadn't restored the most recent versions of some of my applications, e.g. OmniFocus, Transmission, Skim, and PTH Pasteboard. I checked my TM backup, and sure enough, it had not backed up recent updates.
I noticed that all those programs have one thing in common: built in updaters. The programs download and install the updates themselves. I used the built in updaters to get the latest versions of the above programs, then ran Time Machine. Time Machine did not back them up. Hmm...
Second bit of strangeness: Prior to my HD upgrade, I kept my iTunes Library on an external drive. After the upgrade I had enough space for my iTunes library on my internal. I changed the Library location in the iTunes prefs, then did a "Consolidate Library" in iTunes. It dutifully copied my 100+ GB of music to my internal drive.
I then did a "Backup Now" in Time Machine. It didn't recognize the that any new files had been added.
So I decided to restart my computer to see if that had any effect. Bingo! Time Machine recognized the new music files AND the programs I had updated.
Call me crazy, but this seems like a bug. Anyone else run into this problem?

I seem to have a similar problem except not solved by a restart. I have been creating and editing files today and plugged into my backup disc this evening and I cannot seem to get these files into the backup. In time machine they only appear in the Now screen.
I corrupted a backup by the power failing on the external disc during a backup, so I deleted the time machine folders for that Mac and started a new backup. That new backup does not appear to be progressing, although the time stamped versions are there.

Time machine not updating all files correctly.

I went to recover a file today from time machine, and upon recovering it found out that it hasn't been backed up for over 2 months. This is a little concerning since it appears that all is going well.
Does anyone know how to fix this or a way to trouble shoot this.
Thanks

The only thing that I have in the excluded list is the external drive that the server is backing up to.
KM

Time Machine not saving backups to HD

My Time Machine has lost all the backups before 3/11/13 (except for the initial BU) and my HD backup "recent" file quits backing up on 3/11/13. What has happened? I think I did a "restore" about that time but don't remember what or why.
OSX 10.6.8, iMac 3.33ghz, 4g RAM

Most commonly used backup methods

Time Machine not backing up files

Hi there,
I have had an external hard drive connected via time machine for over a year now, and it has always performed continual backups on its own. Yesterday, however, it decided to no longer recognize the device and it now claims that time machine is not configured. I have tried restarting, shutting down and plugging everything in again multiple times, but nothing seems to work. It can't recognize the drive anymore, and the most recent thing I did was download the latest Mac OS X 10.5.8 software. Once I did that, it was recognized briefly under Disk Utility and I tried to Verify and Repair it. It couldn't complete the task, however, and now it doesn't show up. Suggestions?

Hi, and welcome to the forums.
If it doesn't show up in Disk Utility, it's pretty likely failed.
Disconnect and power it down for several minutes. Restart your Mac, then reconnect and power the drive up.
Check all the connections; be sure they're snug and secure. Try different ports, cables, and combinations of the two (sometimes a plug that works fine in one port won't quite make good contact in another one).
If Disk Utility still can't see it, it's probably dead. Is it in warranty? If so, contact the maker or store where you bought it.
If DU can see it, but still can't repair it, a heavy-duty 3rd-party disk repair app such as +Disk Warrior+ might. DW is about $100, and a good investment for the future, but there's no guarantee. Otherwise, try erasing it, but click +Security Options,+ then +Zero Out Disk.+ If that fails, the disk is a goner. If it succeeds, it may be ok.

InDesign not saving certain files

Any idea how to solve the following issues?
I have 6 versions of a 32pp A5 InDesign document, each one a different language. Working on them all yesterday. 4 worked fine, and saved all the work done on them. 2 appeared to be working most of the day, and saved work I was doing in them until about 3pm. However, these both say that they were last saved 2 days previous. Since 3pm, neither of these documents has saved any work done, and I haven't been able to save or close the documents, with or without saving changes. To close InDesign I have to Force Quit. The InDesign Lock Files appear to remain open even though the documents are not open. I have tried saving the documents under a different name, but that doesn't work. The colour of my pasteboard also reset itself to the default colour.
My colleague started getting these issues a couple of days before I did in a similar document she was working on. She did a lot of work on the document one day, and saved regularly. However the next day she went into the document and found that none of her work had been saved, and the document says it was last saved on 14th November! Because of this, she created a new document, and was copying everything from the problem document over into the new one. That appeared to be working initially, however some work she did in the new document wasn't saved, though other work that was done in it later was saved.

Fiona@LandmarkPress wrote:
They were originally created in QuarkXpress, but then converted to ID CS5.5.
I seem to recall some bugs in the initial German release of CS5.5, but that may not be pertinent.
I suspect this is just creeping corruption from multiple conversions. Best practice when converting from Quark or Pagemaker is to immediately export to .idml to clean up as much crud as possible, and it's safer to export legacy files to .idml as well, then open those for conversion in the new version. We see too many reports of bad things suddenly happening with converted legaicy .indd files.
At this point there may not be much you can do if you are not able to save as (does CC still offer Export to .idml?). When you've given up all hope of saving the current state, if the files are still open, you can try a force quit and reopen ID. Sometimes autorecovery will work and you will have most of the current state, and the ability to save .idml might be restored. It's a gamble, so save for last.

Time machine not completely backing up certain folders

Has anyone run into a problem with their Time Machine continually neglecting to backup one or two of their folders? I know some people have problems with TM not backing up items on their desktop, but my desktop data is fine. There are just two folders (as far as I know) that TM refuses to back up (unless there are new items, then it will backup only those items). One is my 'documents' folder. And another folder I created called 'OS media'.
About my setup:
I recently set up Time Machine with my Macbook Pro (running Mavericks). TM is backing up the internal SSD along with an external hard drive that is always attached via USB. The drive they are being backed up onto is a Western Digital My Book Live via wifi--which I know is not advised as it is not officially approved by Apple, but I'm hoping that's not the cause of this particular problem. Because otherwise the MBL has been working pretty well.
More details:
Both of the problem folders happen to be from the external hard drive (not internal SSD), and in the first tier of folders. But the other folders on that tier (about five other folders) are fully entact in TM, so I don't think it's an issue with the external HD. And the missing files are not a certain file type, they are all the sub-folders and files under the problem folders.
I went into the Western Digital (Time Machine) drive itself via Finder and verified that the files are indeed missing, so it wasn't a lag issue. And I have nothing excluded from backups in TM preferences.
I noticed that within those two problem folders, if any file was modified or created within that folder since my initial TM full backup (about two weeks ago), even if it was just a modified .ds_store file, TM would begin to include that file in the backup. This make me guess the problem was something that happened during the initial TM backup. The folders were somehow missed, and subsequent TM incremental backups aren't able to detect that it's missing. So unless anyone has any other suggestions, I'm just going to try to redo a full backup. I'm reluctant though, because it's going to take about two days to complete, and I really have no idea if it's even going to help.
And I don't know if this is related, but when I'm in Time Machine and I do a search for any of my files, I always get zero results.
Important sidenote:
While browsing my folders in Time Machine (Star Wars view), I found that clicking on an alias to a folder would open up that folder, but it didn't show the contents of the folder as they were in that particular backup version; instead, it showed the contents of that folder as they appeared in my computer currently. In other words, it appeared that I was looking at an old backup version of the folder, but it was actually the present time folder. This could easily mislead someone into thinking that their current data is backed up, when it is not.

oregonjoe wrote:
Am I to understand people should not post questions that involve any 3rd party products that are not officially supported by Apple?
No, but you must understand that Time Machine does not support the configuration you are using.
The exhaustive list of devices supported by Time Machine amounts to the following:
AirPort Time Capsule's built-in hard disk (any model)
External USB hard disk drive connected to a Time Capsule (any model)
External USB hard disk drive connected to an AirPort Extreme (current model only)
A hard disk drive directly connected either to the source Mac, or a Mac on your local network.
That is all.
Use whatever backup device you want, but you should be aware that this site is full of reports of misery from hapless individuals who had been using third party NAS devices for Time Machine backups, only to find that they were incomplete, corrupted, or useless in the dire circumstances in which they were required. Apple won't care if you lose your data while using a Time Machine configuration specifically excluded from their technical support documents.

I've used an external drive for time machine which has important files on it. After trying to back up my computer, it suddenly needed to be "repaired" by utilities. Now it's not being "seen" at all! How do I recover my important files off the drive?

I've used an external drive for time machine which has important files on it. After trying to back up my computer, it suddenly needed to be "repaired" by utilities. Now it's not being "seen" at all! How do I recover my important files off the drive?

If the external drive can be seen at all in Disk Utility, follow the instructions for repair here.

TS1550 Back up to time machine failed. Error, "Files can't be copied onto the backup disk because it appears to be read-only". Back up has been working. drive is not read only. How do I fix this?

Back up to time machine failed. Error, "Files can’t be copied onto the backup disk because it appears to be read-only". Back up has been working. drive is not read only. How do I fix this?

Hello,
http://pondini.org/TM/C6.html

Both my husband and I have our Macs backed up on Time Machine. I have a new Mac and want to download my files,etc. from Timeline to my new Mac. How do I ensure that Time Machine downloads only MY files, and not my husband's files?

Both my husband and I have our MacBook Pros backed up to Time Machine. I have a new MacBook Pro and want to download my files, etc. from Time Machine to my new Mac. I do I ensure that Time Machine downloads only MY files to my new Mac, and not my husband's files?

OS X uses a unique identifier so there will be no problems.

Mixing 10.4 and 10.5 with Time Machine--not a good idea (?)

I'm planning on installing 10.5 (aka Leopard) in a separate partition to tweak and trial it until its ready for prime time for me (for one thing the new X11 isn't fully up to speed and that's a show stopper for my business use of Leopard).
It occurred to me that since Time Machine (TM) works off file system events in Leopard, it'd be wrong do most of my work in 10.4, occasionally using 10.5 and expect TM to record the changes made whilst working under 10.4.
It seems to me that TM will only "see" changes made under 10.5, not changes made under 10.4. If right (and I can't see why it'd be wrong), you can't mix 10.4, 10.5 and TM and get "sane" backups.
It'd follow, then that I should hold off using TM until running exclusively 10.5--?
Comments welcome. (No flames to Apple please!)
(PS: For techs--I'm simplifying the issue here I know! Trying to write something that's makes halfway sense for others too.)

I believe those paragraphs on their own say that under Tiger, if an application stops "listening" to fs events for a long period of time as the fs events aren't logged and the application has to figure it out for itself, but this is a different time-frame and mechanism that I think TM works off. If you read on, the article will point out that a difference in Leopard is that there is now a log that can be scanned, which I imagine is what TM works off. However, that's only in Leopard, AFAIK.
What is being asked here is a bit more subtle (again, AFAICT!)-- does Leopard know of or learn changes that happened whilst it wasn't in control of the file system and go on to save these?
These can't come from the fs events directly, since there is no mechanism for Tiger to send these to a dormant Leopard that I've read of. There is apparently no fs event log in Tiger, so it can't come from that either. So my guess was that either (a) they'd just be missed or (b) the overall "last time/date modified" or someother file-system-as-a-whole time stamp or checksum is being used to identify that things weren't as they were last TM looked at that filesystem, therefore something must have happened in its absence. This seemed an open question to me... hence my question.
I agree it'd be easiest to just run a few simple tests. I just might wait until I get Leopard and do it myself...!
I wrote the post below before you wrote and forgot to post it, but for the **** of it here's what I wrote:
Maybe I'll have to wait until I installed Leopard and run a few simple tests myself (like the one I posted earlier). In the meantime if anyone does run a test, let us know the result!
gnaegi: I'm aware of how TM stores the data, but thanks for the link. It uses a variant on the hard-link sync approach used by rsync. I was more concerned how TM detects changes in its absence. So as far as I can tell the file system event tracking log file is only in Leopard (Note: the file system events are in Tiger, but AFAIK, not the file sytem event log file; I would like to think that TM works off the log file, not the raw events as Spotlight does. Certainly reading between the lines in Ars article would supports this idea. To my reading anyway )

Time Machine Not Saving certain files

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