Does iCloud backup to Time Machine when created on a Mac

No, what you put in iCloud will not be backup on your local Time Machine back unless you have a cope stored on your hard drive.

davidfromnuneaton wrote:

Hi,

Ive decided to store some pages and numbers documents onto the iCloud to allow access when out and about on my various devices but are these documents backed up to Time Machine.

Yes they will, (If you are using Time Machine at the default settings). All documents you save to iCloud are also saved on your Mac (in ~/library/mobile documents) thus Time Machine will back them up. If you have changed the TM settings and ecluded the library then they won't, but you would have had to choose to do that.

Eric Ross wrote:

No, what you put in iCloud will not be backup on your local Time Machine back unless you have a cope stored on your hard drive.

FYI Eric, Files saved to iCloud are on the local Mac as well (~/library/mobile documents) thi is the default location.

This is incorrect. Time Machine will NOT back up the contents of ~/Library/Mobile Documents. Even though the files are local, Time Machine excludes them.

I'm not a fan of this, but it is what it is.

I thought Time Machine backs up your User Library unless you choose to exclude it.

William Lloyd wrote:

This is incorrect. Time Machine will NOT back up the contents of ~/Library/Mobile Documents. Even though the files are local, Time Machine excludes them.

I'm not a fan of this, but it is what it is.

Are you sure that the user library is excluded by default?

PS

I just checked. The user Library is included (or not excluded if you prefer) so the advice is correct.

Well I'll be!

Last I checked, this data didn't seem to be backed up. But now it is. I wonder if it changed or I was just crazy. I'll assume the former, as the latter is impossible :-)

I'll do the crazy bit for you, I am apparantly rather skilled in that arena 🙂

Also, I know that ~/Library is backed up by default, but I was under the impression that ~/Libary/Mobile Documents itself was excluded, because the files were already "backed up" in the cloud (I also know that the cloud is not necessarily a backup, but I digress...)

I use iCloud storage as an online file store (for those unimportant things that accumulate) I don't use TM but I do use an alternative (2 actually), I can see what is going to the backup and that folder appeared as soon as I saved a file into it.

You are correct regarding what is included in a Time Machine back-up, I mis-read the MobileBackups string I was thinking they not included. I just check the /System/ Library/ CoreServices/ backupd.bundle/ Contents/ Resources/StdExclusions.plist

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple Computer//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

<plist version="1.0">

<dict>

<!-- paths we do not want to include in a system backup -->

<key>PathsExcluded</key>

<array>

<string>/.MobileBackups</string>

<string>/MobileBackups.trash</string>

<string>/.MobileBackups.trash</string>

<string>/.Spotlight-V100</string>

<string>/.TemporaryItems</string>

<string>/.Trashes</string>

<string>/.com.apple.backupd.mvlist.plist</string>

<string>/.fseventsd</string>

<string>/.hotfiles.btree</string>

<string>/Backups.backupdb</string>

<string>/Desktop DB</string>

<string>/Desktop DF</string>

<string>/Network/Servers</string>

<string>/Library/Updates</string>

<string>/Previous Systems</string>

<string>/Users/Shared/SC Info</string>

<string>/Users/Guest</string>

<string>/dev</string>

<string>/home</string>

<string>/net</string>

<string>/private/var/db/com.apple.backupd.backupVerification</string>

<string>/private/var/db/efw_cache</string>

<string>/private/var/db/Spotlight</string> <!-- old tiger location of the Spotlight db -->

<string>/private/var/db/Spotlight-V100</string> <!-- old tiger location of the Spotlight db -->

<string>/private/var/lib/postfix/greylist.db</string>

</array>

<!-- paths where we need to capture top level folder to restore disk structure, but don't want to backup any contents -->

<key>ContentsExcluded</key>

<array>

<string>/Volumes</string>

<string>/Network</string>

<string>/automount</string>

<string>/.vol</string>

<string>/tmp</string>

<string>/cores</string>

<string>/private/tmp</string>

<string>/private/Network</string>

<string>/private/tftpboot</string>

<string>/private/var/automount</string>

<string>/private/var/folders</string>

<string>/private/var/run</string>

<string>/private/var/tmp</string>

<string>/private/var/vm</string>

<string>/private/var/db/dhcpclient</string>

<string>/private/var/db/fseventsd</string>

<string>/Library/Caches</string>

<string>/Library/Logs</string>

<string>/System/Library/Caches</string>

<string>/System/Library/Extensions/Caches</string>

</array>

<!-- paths where we need to capture entire subtree folder layout to restore disk structure, but don't want to backup contained files -->

<key>FileContentsExcluded</key>

<array>

<string>/private/var/log</string>

<string>/private/var/spool/cups</string>

<string>/private/var/spool/fax</string>

<string>/private/var/spool/uucp</string>

</array>

<!-- standard user paths we want to skip for each user (subpath relative to root of home directory) -->

<key>UserPathsExcluded</key>

<array>

<string>Library/Application Support/SyncServices/data.version</string>

<string>Library/Application Support/Ubiquity</string>

<string>Library/Caches</string>

<string>Library/Logs</string>

<string>Library/Mail/Envelope Index</string>

<string>Library/Mail/Envelope Index-journal</string>

<string>Library/Mail/AvailableFeeds</string>

<string>Library/Mail/Metadata/BackingStoreUpdateJournal</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/Envelope Index</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/Envelope Index-journal</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/AvailableFeeds</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/BackingStoreUpdateJournal</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/Envelope Index-shm</string>

<string>Library/Mail/V2/MailData/Envelope Index-wal</string>

<string>Library/Mirrors</string>

<string>Library/PubSub/Database</string>

<string>Library/PubSub/Downloads</string>

<string>Library/PubSub/Feeds</string>

<string>Library/Safari/Icons.db</string>

<string>Library/Safari/WebpageIcons.db</string>

<string>Library/Safari/HistoryIndex.sk</string>

</array>

</dict>

</plist>

It's easy to confuse:

/.MobileBackups (Local Snapshots) are excluded.

~/Library/Mobile Documents.<number> (local copies of iCloud documents) are included by default.

That wasn't confusing me, but I didn't know about the StdExclusions.plist file. Very interesting. Thanks for posting.

There are often some other automatic exclusions as well, mostly on data files for particular apps.

See the yellow box inTime Machine - Frequently Asked Question #11.