Time Machine: one external drive does not show up in time machine's "exclusion" panel

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Level 1

9 points

Time Machine: one external drive does not show up in time machine's "exclusion" panel

Time machine panel where you choose disks to include/exclude for backup does not show one of my external disks. This disk has been previously backed up with Time Machine and I can see the backups of it when I enter Time Machine, but it no longer shows up in the panel where you exclude disks for backup, so I assume it will no longer back up that disk. This external shows up on the desktop, in Finder, and everywhere else, just not in the Time Machine Exclude panel. If I click the + button at the bottom of that panel, the external shows up in the icons for all disks, but not in the Exclude panel. The drive is connected by firewire, same ports as usual.

Mac Mini late 2012, 16 g ram, fusion drive, High Sierra

Questions:

Is there any way to make Time Machine offer this disk for inclusion/exclusion?
I am afraid to let Time Machine resume backups till I figure this out. Will it "lose" the contents of the disappeared drive? If so, how soon?
Should I let Time Machine run and see if that drive changes in the backup, or is there some danger to that?
Is there a good detailed learning resource about Time Machine?

Mac mini, macOS 10.13

Posted on Jun 7, 2019 6:23 AM

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Answer 1

pvanevery Author

Level 1

9 points

Jun 7, 2019 7:10 AM in response to Lexiepex

Thanks for trying to help! I confess to not having extensive knowledge of Time Machine! The list in TM Preferences is not what I would expect, because the external in question is not named. But I am not sure how much of a problem this is.

The "missing" disk, named LaCie, is the disk that contains my photos. It has been backed up successfully for years, along with my HD, to time machine, which is on a different external named SeagateTM. I have added a third external named photos2. I am attaching a screenshot (second attached image below) of what I see in the TM Preferences/Options screen, where "LaCie" does not appear as either grayed out (like the Seagate TM disk) or as a disk I could potentially exclude. So I am worried that TM will not back LaCie up any more as it does not appear to know LaCie is still there even though LaCie shows up in Finder, desktop and everywhere else I expect it to.

And no, the "missing" disk (LaCie) was never used for anything other than what it is, a storage for photos. All the data is on the disk which is performing as expected: Lightroom is accessing the disk, reading from/writing to it, files can be easily retrieved or written to it, etc. The list is as expected except for LaCie. Yet, if I click the + sign to find other disks to exclude, LaCie is visible in that screen (first screen shot). I don't know whether this means the drive is already included and will continue to be backed up unless I add it to the Excluded list using that +sign, or whether it means Time Machine really doesn't know the thing is available to be backed up. And I have been unable to find a resource that explains these dialogue boxes throughly.

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Answer 2

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jun 7, 2019 6:43 AM in response to pvanevery

I don't understand exactly:

Did you ever do the time machine operation TO the "missing" disk , even it was only a second? Then you will probably not succeed to place the "missing" disk in the exclusion panel.

If you are sure that was not the case, open TimeMachinePreferences: choose "select disk": is the list as you would expect?

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Answer 3

Lexiepex

Level 6

14,102 points

Jun 7, 2019 7:36 AM in response to pvanevery

From the second screen shot: the "Lacie" will be backed up with TM, the "photos2" will not be backed up with TM.

I suppose you clicked "exclude" in the first screen shot.

Maybe an "unwilling" bit.

I suggest to clear caches:

Shutdown the mac,

start the mac while holding the Shift key, this is a slow happening....

When the Safe mode is finally there, enter your pasword and you will be in the "safe mode".

See if you can now enter Lacie in the exclude list of TM,

Then log out and restart normal,

A lot of system caches are now cleared.

check the exclude list in TM, and add Lacie if it is not there, it will not be backed up when it is in the list

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Answer 4

pvanevery Author

Level 1

9 points

Jun 7, 2019 8:06 AM in response to BDAqua

Thank you!

So it may be working properly and I just don't understand it well enough! That is good news for sure!

I have now EXCLUDED the Photos2 disk and it has vanished as well. So I am assuming Vanished in this screen means Good, It Is Covered. So when you EXCLUDE something, you are actually INCLUDING it by EXCLUDING it from exclusion? Wow, that is some convoluted thinking for this old lady to wrap her mind around.

I don't guess it will hurt anything to let it run and see what is captured.

One more question: if a drive is no longer connected to the machine at all, but was previously connected and backed up to TM, will the TM backups for that drive remain within TM?

You have been a great help already!

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Answer 5

BDAqua

Level 10

239,855 points

Jun 7, 2019 8:39 AM in response to pvanevery

Your thinking too hard, adding it to the Privacy pane or exclusion means things in that list are NOT included in the backup, everything NOT excluded will be included in the backed up. :)

Yes, TM will keep those unless it gets short of space & deletes older backups... not sure it deletes non connected backups when it needs space but it could.

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