Keksi

Q: How can I turn off iCloud completely?

Hello guys,

 

configuration: MacBook Pro with current Lion, iPad and iPhone both with iOS 4, NOT using iCloud.

 

I switched ON iCloud on my MacBook Pro to see what happens. Then I tried to switch it off again since I decided that I don't want the system to push everything I do on my computer up into the iCloud, congesting my network.

 

Now when I tried to turn off iCloud for my Documents and Data, it says that all data stored in the iCloud would be deleted from my Mac. ****, what's that? Will I now never again be able to detatch my computer from this iCloud thing without losing all my files?

 

Please help!

 

Many thanx in advance

Keksi

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.2)

Posted on Oct 21, 2011 12:25 PM

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Q: How can I turn off iCloud completely?

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  • by ogott,

    ogott ogott Nov 22, 2011 7:56 AM in response to Keksi
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 22, 2011 7:56 AM in response to Keksi

    I have the same problem. I even reset ipad and iphone (erazed all data and set up as a new device), delete all backups on Itunes  and icloud entries (manually on their web), disable icloud - and then when I thought everything is clean sync my devices and still have all 3 - 4 the same entries on devices in ical. THIS IS CRAZY- apple invaded in my devices and does whatever wants - more than a VIRUS! I can't get rid off it. Now I guess I have to spend most of my time to erase it manually from my devices! APPLE what the **** are you doing, making your new software behavour as a parasite! Who is first: customers or  ......

  • by IMRAN,

    IMRAN IMRAN Nov 23, 2011 8:32 PM in response to Keksi
    Level 2 (488 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 23, 2011 8:32 PM in response to Keksi

    I love Apple since it started and been a Mac user since it came out. Much that MobileMe was frustrating and had a lousy launch, I thought it was impossible to make something worse than MobileMe. Apple succeeded with this disaster, data destroying, heart burning, stomach churning and hours wasting beast called iCloud.

     

    See iCloud Server Error: Can't add/edit contacts + it overwrites AddressBook edits By IMRAN Happy to have your thoughts on how to solve that nightmare. My last attempt (manually restorying my 5000 contacts in AddressBook, then painfully manually deleting contacts in iCloud {Select All > Delete there gives Server Errors also}. Finally managed. Then resyncing the MacBook Pro to iCloud led to 1000 contacts NOT syncing and no way except manually listing each address list side by side to figure out which ones it missed pulling in. Horror. Disaster. Shame.

     

    For the user who says that turning off iCloud on the Mac and accepting its offer to delete data will delete data only on the cloud, sorry, but, unless I misunderstood you, that is dangerously wrong.

     

    Like an evil spawn of SkyNet and a PC Boot Sector Virus, once iCloud has grabbed your data IT becomes the master of your data, your digital life. Deleting stuff means the stuff on your DEVICE (e.g. MacBook Pro, where you created and have all the ORIGINAL data in that iCloud sucked in) is what will be destroyed. Be careful.

     

    If you're playing with this beast, not only make backups of your data in AddressBook and iCal, but invest in an external drive and clone your whole hard drive.

     

    I am literally having to make a decision tonight, keep my MacBook Pro as the master, and sync via iTunes to the iPhone 4S and 4. I have an iMac mostly for music and video, which it was "cool" to have synced iCal and AB on, though not regularly used. But, after the hours wasted with iCloud, and the repeated data loss, I can live without the iMac being a synced device.

     

    Hope this helps.

     

    Regards

     

    Imran Anwar

  • by BekahB,

    BekahB BekahB Nov 24, 2011 5:50 PM in response to IMRAN
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 24, 2011 5:50 PM in response to IMRAN

    I activated iCloud on my MBP and iPhone a couple of weeks ago. I haven't had any trouble with synced data, but my computer has been very slow and doing a lot of pinwheeling. I tried to deactivate it on my MBP, and I was shocked to get the messages that calendars, contacts, and files would be removed from my MBP. I backed up my calendars and my address book, double-checked my Time Maching back-up, and clicked through the screens to deactivate iCloud. Indeed, my calendars disappeared (with the exception of the two Google calendars that I have via subscription). My contacts were not deleted, and all of my files appear to be intact.

     

    Rather than restore my calendars from back up, I simpley plugged my phone in and synced it the old way. I received a message that I didn't need to back up that way, since things are backing up through iCloud. I had to click a few times, but it finally synced. Upon completion, my calendars were all back!

     

    My computer seems to be functioning normally again. What a relief!

  • by Alan Brunettin,

    Alan Brunettin Alan Brunettin Jan 27, 2012 3:46 PM in response to BekahB
    Level 2 (340 points)
    Jan 27, 2012 3:46 PM in response to BekahB

    I am reading this thread in disbelief. Can iCloud really be this awful? I too wanted to disconnect from iCloud but was sacred off by the evil message about all content on my iMac would be deleted.

     

    I mean, first of all, WHY? What on earth is the rationale for that? Why doesn ANYTHING have to be deleted?

    Ach!

     

    But anyway, I guess I'm fortunate that I haven't iClouded anything so far other than my contacts and calendars, but do I understand correctly that since my iMac and iPhone are synched thusly I can disconnect from iCloud, let it delete any **** thing it wants from my iMac, and I can then re-sync the calendars/contacts with the iPhone via hardwire?

  • by Keksi,

    Keksi Keksi Jan 27, 2012 11:34 PM in response to Alan Brunettin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 27, 2012 11:34 PM in response to Alan Brunettin

    Dear Alan

     

    I described further above in this thread the procedure how to detach iCal from iCloud. AFAIK there is no other way. But maybe things changed in the meanwhile.

     

    Your contacts should be OK after switching off iCloud. I think there are no additional steps necessary.

     

    However I read in many places all over the net that address book entries were multiplicated or deleted. So to be on the safe side, BACKUP YOUR DATA BEFOREHAND!!!

     

    Best regards and good luck

    Keksi

  • by BekahB,

    BekahB BekahB Jan 28, 2012 2:47 AM in response to Alan Brunettin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 28, 2012 2:47 AM in response to Alan Brunettin

    I would second what Keksi said: backup before you turn iCloud off. I also ended up with a bunch of duplicate entries in contacts and iCal, but I removed them by playing around with the sync settings and resyncing until everything looked right. As a result, and despite having synced before de-iClouding, I lost all of the contacts that I had entered on my iPhone. I'm not sure why that would happen, but it has certainly been an inconvenience.

     

    I truly hope that the issues with iCloud are resolved soon. I like the idea!

     

    Best,

     

    Bekah

  • by Alan Brunettin,

    Alan Brunettin Alan Brunettin Jan 28, 2012 12:09 PM in response to BekahB
    Level 2 (340 points)
    Jan 28, 2012 12:09 PM in response to BekahB

    Well with backups safely nestled on a remote drive I went ahead and disconnected iCloud at my iMac. Lo and behold the contacts and calendars remained unscathed. Great, I thought, now all I need to do is disconnect my iPhone and even if something is lost I can resync with the iMac.

     

    No such luck. Oddly the calendar remained intact but the contacts were empty. Okay, no prob, I thought. I merrily booted iTunes and clicked the synching options and waited. After too short a time the synching completed and sure enough my iPhone's contacts remained empty.

     

    After several exports/imports of the backup contacts I noticed that in the Contacts index list iCloud continued to be referenced as the holder of contacts, Ergo, I presume, there are none on my iMac to sync the iPhone with. This is ominous because I have iCloud turned off/disconnected at every point I can think of where my iMac might be hooking up with it.

     

    I don't know what to do now. Apparently backing up the contacts list embedded its connection with iCloud and I have no way to tell it not to. Given that, I don't think even a restore of my iPhone would help if the contacts on the computer remain property of iCloud.

     

    Can this be turning into any more insidious, 1984ish situation?

  • by Keksi,

    Keksi Keksi Jan 28, 2012 12:47 PM in response to Alan Brunettin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jan 28, 2012 12:47 PM in response to Alan Brunettin

    Dear Alan

     

    So all your contacts are there, but still connected to the iCloud. Right?

     

    I *DARE* not to switch on again my iCloud and then try to re-detach my contacts from it. But you may try the same strategy I applied to iCal:

     

    1:     Export all calendars from within iCal to local files

    2:     Switch off iCloud (-> all calendars are gone)

    3:     Import all calendars back from the exported files (And they were imported as LOCAL!, thank God)

     

    So you could try this:

     

    1:     Export all contacts from AddressBook (File -> Export… -> Address Book Archive…)

    2:     Switch off iCloud (-> all contacts are gone)

    3:     Import all contacts back from the exported file (File -> Import…)

     

    I hope it works! Did you scan other forums in the net about this issue?

     

    I hate iCloud >:-( And I'm very disappoined about Apple that they produce such crappy software.

     

    To BekahB: The idea would be great if it worked.

     

    Best regards

    Keksi

  • by Alan Brunettin,

    Alan Brunettin Alan Brunettin Jan 28, 2012 3:24 PM in response to Keksi
    Level 2 (340 points)
    Jan 28, 2012 3:24 PM in response to Keksi

    So all your contacts are there, but still connected to the iCloud. Right?

    Well, yes and no. I mean theoretically I'm NOT connected to iC but the contacts are being told they belong to iC. If I go to the base-level index of Address Book "On My Mac" tops everything but nothing is in it. Directly below it is "iCloud" and under that are all my various divisions of the contact list.

     

    Now as it happened I had a 3-week old backup of the AB, somehow. I deleted all the iC contacts and imported the old backup. I also deleted the iC account in the AB prefs so the only account was only "On My Mac" And great! There were my contacts with no reference to iC in the index. However, if I did the reverse--delete older backup contacts and import today's backup--not only does the iC indexing reappear but it also creates an iCloud account in the list of accounts without my doing anything.

     

    On top of all this, when I imported that older contact list, my iPhone now will not sync at all. So I think I'm looking at restoring that puppy. Maybe that will fix it.

     

    Anyway I did do what you describe perhaps not in that order but as you say I prolly don't want to go reestablishing the link to iC again to find out. And no I haven't investigated other forums. This was he first I found.

     

    And yes, I hate iCloud too. And it's funny too, isn't there a story out there that Steve Jobs was quite perturbed with the team that brought us MobileMe; that he thought it was a failure? I can't believe he would have considered iCloud an improvement. Talk about "fail."

  • by specimen38,

    specimen38 specimen38 Mar 19, 2012 6:30 AM in response to Alan Brunettin
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Mar 19, 2012 6:30 AM in response to Alan Brunettin

    And yes, I hate iCloud too. And it's funny too, isn't there a story out there that Steve Jobs was quite perturbed with the team that brought us MobileMe; that he thought it was a failure? I can't believe he would have considered iCloud an improvement. Talk about "fail."

    --------------------

    MobileMe had one great advantage over iCloud. You could launch apps from iDisk and update them. You cannot do that with iCloud. There are no folders that I can conceive in Documents in the Cloud. Finally, when I download a Keynote file to my new iPad it reformats it from 16:9 to a 4:3 aspect ratio.

     

    I'm looking for a cloud service that will let me launch apps firm a disk in the cloud. Until then, my Mac will be my cloud drive using Remote HD.

  • by Chris Dubuque,

    Chris Dubuque Chris Dubuque Mar 31, 2012 12:17 PM in response to Keksi
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Mar 31, 2012 12:17 PM in response to Keksi

    After playing with iCloud more in the last few momths, I have confirmed my initial feeling that iCloud is a disaster. Total failure, especially if you have spouse, kids, etc on the same Apple account since you keep getting each others stuff on your phone. But I do like the Find My Phone feature. Especially for the kids. I can keep track of where they are without them knowing

  • by uandm1,

    uandm1 uandm1 Aug 29, 2012 2:23 AM in response to Keksi
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Aug 29, 2012 2:23 AM in response to Keksi

    Since upgrading to ML on iMac, I also have problems with iCloud. Especially contacts, after I switched iCloud off, contacts vanish, followed by severe horrible thoughts! Phew, back up on remote hard drive. But then I tried turning iCloud on, and wonders, every contact is back.

     

    To cut a long story short, has anyone tried Keksis' method

    Quote:

     

    1:     Export all contacts from AddressBook (File -> Export… -> Address Book Archive…)

    2:     Switch off iCloud (-> all contacts are gone)

    3:     Import all contacts back from the exported file (File -> Import…) unquote.

     

     

    ??

    I'm of the age that start distrusting this "new fangled business". I do not want iCloud, yet. I am happy with all my contacts, documents, etc., on my iMac, but, I do understand that others want to be able to access their contacts etc. etc., on other devices. So, for me It doesn't work! I can see the idea behind the application, but some severe thought needs to be done to make it work. And judging by the above posts, that ain't been done,  yet.

     

    To my original question, has anyone tried Keksis' method? or should I be a guinea pig and try ?

     

    Cheers.

  • by Peter the Engineer,

    Peter the Engineer Peter the Engineer Nov 4, 2012 10:34 AM in response to Keksi
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 4, 2012 10:34 AM in response to Keksi

    Thanks to all who have pioneered the wilderness before me.

     

    I use the MoinMoin wiki as a personal information manager (PIM).  It's easy-to-use and written in Python so it runs almost everywhere.  Because this is my central PIM I want to be able to run it from anywhere: any of my Macs, Windows machines, or Linux boxen.  I used to do this with the complete wiki, programs and data, on my MobileMe disk.  It worked fine.  The Wiki contains data, from daily notes, to notes on people I've met, to copies of reference papers, to code.

     

    I had planned to do the same thing with iCloud.  In fact, I came across this Community while hunting for hints on how to do it.  After reading this thread, I think I'll change my mind.

     

    As a suggestion for people with a requirement such as mine, DropBox has appeared to work very well.  I used it to store my Wiki data for several months.  It appears in your finder as a disk.  You can use it offline and it will sync when you get back on the Net.  There are clients for iOS devices and BlackBerries, although I haven't figured out how to use them productively.  The one drawback is that, when you hit the limit, it just dumps all further input.  It doesn't give any grace period, not even for a few minutes.

     

    I don't have any experience with either Google's or Amazon's cloud offerings.

     

    So, thank you very much.  Losing my data would have been a disaster!  I believed you haved saved me from doing it.

  • by hurgaaA,

    hurgaaA hurgaaA Nov 28, 2012 1:22 PM in response to uandm1
    Level 1 (5 points)
    Nov 28, 2012 1:22 PM in response to uandm1

    THX,

     

    I just went through the same night mare.

    Disconnected from iCloud and my calendars were gone.

     

    INSANE! I thought my mac was the main point of plate axes.

    but no.

    Apple is the center of the universe now.

     

    I followed your steps and back it is, my calendars are back on my mac.

    iCloud is dead. Long life iCloud.

    ah, i love my dropbox...

  • by Julian Wright,

    Julian Wright Julian Wright Nov 29, 2012 12:11 AM in response to hurgaaA
    Level 7 (34,867 points)
    Nov 29, 2012 12:11 AM in response to hurgaaA

    If you took the time to understand how iCloud and other online calendar sync services work, you would not think it insane that your calendars disappear when you disconnect from the service.

     

    The calendar on your phone or computer is simply viewing the master calendar stored on the iCloud server. If you disconnect from the server then quite clearly the calendars will no longer be viewable.

     

    It's like disconnecting your television set from the cable box, and then expecting your TV programs to still be viewable.

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