icloud archive

[Peg Mac Fan but confused]

Can I automatically sync iCloud and iCloud Archive? Well, and iCloud Archive-1 since I have both?

I must have signed out of iCloud a month or two ago and then signed back in. I realized today that I now have most of my files in iCloud, iCloud Archive and Archive-1. However some files are only in one of the Archives

Is there a process or routine that will run a comparison for me and tell me which has the latest of each file? I want to save the latest but don't want to do a manual comparison of all my files.

Thank you

 

[Mike Boreham]

Sounds like you need to use the merge folders technique in this article. Another article that may help is this one.

I assume from what you have said that you have “Desktop and Documents in iCloud" enabled so that your iCloud Drive contains your Documents and Desktop folders, as well as a host of other folders linked to apps. I am not sure whether signing out of iCloud puts copies of these app folders in the Archive folder. You could do the merge folders process at the top iCloud Drive level or at the level of folders within iCloud Drive, eg Documents, Desktop, app folders.

I have not personally done this but these are the outline steps I would follow. I say ‘outline‘ because of the details I am not sure about as above, hence step 1 below!

1. Make sure you have backups of the full size (not optimised) files in your iCloud Drive, and Archive folders before you start.

2. Merge the two Archive folders, so there is only one which contains the latest of any duplicates. Check this carefully and deletc any duplicates, which may be necessary if the file/folder structure was different between them.

3. Merge the new Archive folder with iCloud Drive the same way. Again check for dupicates as in previous step.

 

[Peg Mac Fan but confused]

Perfect! Thank you. That merging option is working well (as long as I stay focused). I really appreciate your helpful reply!
Peg