iCloud Preferences and Time Machine Backup

[jparker402]

When I go to System Preferences>Apple ID>iCloud and select (or not) Optimize Mac Storage, does that in any way effect what happens to Time Machine backup? Almost think listening to one YouTube video that Optimize Mac Storage so that only recently used files remain on my MacBook Air (rest go to iCloud) that those that go to iCloud do not get backed up on Time Machine. How does that work? Thanks!

 

[alFR]

Yes, Time Machine only backs up local files so anything that’s only in iCloud won’t get included in the TM backup. Personally I prefer to keep all my files locally and leave Optimise Mac Storage off, but really it depends on how much local drive space you have vs. the size of your Documents folder.

 

[jparker402]

Hmmmm. Then for years I've deluded myself into thinking that I was backing up both on Time Machine and to iCloud. I have a MacBook Air with a 256 SSD (183GB available) and a My Passport 1TB (with 339GB available) hooked up to Time Machine. If I were to deselect Optimize, what would fill to where? Or have I provided the correct numbers to work with?

 

[alFR]

I wouldn't regard the files in iCloud as a backup. Sure, they can act as one (e.g. if your Mac gets stolen, sudden catastrophic hardware failure) because even if you lose the local copies the files will still be in the cloud, but if you deliberately delete a file locally (or alter it destructively) then the version on iCloud will inherit those changes as well, so you won't have a "good" copy in the cloud to restore. You need either a local backup (using TM, or something like SuperDuper / Carbon Copy Cloner) to help in that situation, or an alternative online backup service like BackBlaze. You don't say whether or not you're using the My Passport for TM or documents or both, but if you're using it for both I'd strongly advise using a separate drive for TM, it can cause issues if you try to put documents on a TM drive as well.

If you turn optimise off, the documents you have in iCloud will download to your internal drive (default location for locally-stored documents from iCloud Drive is ~/Library/Mobile Documents). The stuff on your external drive will not be getting stored in iCloud Drive.

 

[jparker402]

I wouldn't regard the files in iCloud as a backup. Sure, they can act as one (e.g. if your Mac gets stolen, sudden catastrophic hardware failure) because even if you lose the local copies the files will still be in the cloud, but if you deliberately delete a file locally (or alter it destructively) then the version on iCloud will inherit those changes as well, so you won't have a "good" copy in the cloud to restore. You need either a local backup (using TM, or something like SuperDuper / Carbon Copy Cloner) to help in that situation, or an alternative online backup service like BackBlaze. You don't say whether or not you're using the My Passport for TM or documents or both, but if you're using it for both I'd strongly advise using a separate drive for TM, it can cause issues if you try to put documents on a TM drive as well.

If you turn optimise off, the documents you have in iCloud will download to your internal drive (default location for locally-stored documents from iCloud Drive is ~/Library/Mobile Documents). The stuff on your external drive will not be getting stored in iCloud Drive.

My Passport I use exclusively for Time Machine. (Not smart enough to know how to use it for more than one thing.)

 

[HDFan]

Make sure you have a 3-2-1 backup strategy. TM can only be one of the 3 backups because of its relatlively high failure rate, compared with something like Carbon Copy Cloner. iCloud, as stated above, does not count.

 

[jparker402]

I'm back with what may be a continuation of the above; am not certain. Discovered yesterday that my MacBook Air HD did not have enough free space to download the update of MacOS from 12.1 to 12.2! Yea cats! So am on a quest to delete stuff from my HD to gain some space. Just discovered that there is an iCloud Drive file in Finder that is apparently taking up 178.6 GB!!! In my naivety I thought iCloud was stored in the cloud! What is all this doing in my HD?

Only thing that has changed from the above is that I now have a 500GB Samsung SSD and CCC doing backup. Is there anything I can do to reduce space?