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User profile for user: Casey Heeg
Casey Heeg Author
User level: Level 1
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Time machine deleted all my backups instead of the one selected

I have a one year old Macbook Pro with 16 GB of RAM, running OSX v10.9.5 (Mavericks). I use a LaCie 2TB external hard drive for my time machine backups, and I needed to delete some of the old TM backups to make space.


Following the instructions at pontini.org (http://pondini.org/TM/12.html ), I opened TM, navigated to the external HD and selected the oldest folder in backups.backupdb, right clicked it and selected 'Delete all backups in [the oldest folder's name]'. Then I went home for the weekend, and when I got in this morning, Voila! ALL files in the backups.backupdb folder were gone! Not only that, but there was nothing in the trash to restore!


Has anyone else had this wonderful experience?


Thanks,

Casey

Posted on Feb 23, 2015 4:45 PM

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14 replies
User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 8
46,560 points

Feb 23, 2015 5:10 PM in response to Casey Heeg

I see nothing in Pondini's site that says to do that. There are instructions for deleting individual items from within Time Machine. There are instructions for deleting entire backups from the Finder. It looks like you attempted to merge those instructions by deleting an entire backup from within Time Machine. I guess that deletes the whole thing. The first line on Pondini's page says "Usually, you shouldn't have to. Time Machine automatically "thins" (deletes) backups every time it does a new backup".


My advice has always been to stay out of Time Machine's internals. Let it do its job. If you try to interfere, only bad things will come out of it.

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User profile for user: Casey Heeg
Casey Heeg Author
User level: Level 1
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Feb 23, 2015 6:07 PM in response to etresoft

Thanks for the reply etresoft. If you look on the following link: http://pondini.org/TM/12.html

You'll see the following in a black text box outlined in red:


If necessary, you can delete the following:

  1. •All backups of a particular file or folder -- use Time Machine, per the green box below.
  2. •One or more individual backups -- it's best to use Time Machine, per the green box below, but on Lion or later, you can use the Finder, per the gray box at the bottom of this page.
  3. •An entireset of backups -- all the backups for one Mac. See the yellow box below.

I followed the steps under #2 (to delete 'one or more individual backups'), which referred me to the info in the "green box" as follows:


Use the Time Machine browser (the "Star Wars" display): Enter Time Machine by clicking the Time Machine icon in your Dock or select the TM icon in your Menubar. (To delete backups for a different Mac, see question #17).

  1. Locate the backup or item you want to delete via the Timeline or "cascade" of Finder windows.
  2. {did not apply}
  3. Select and control-click (right-click) the item (or click the "gear" icon in the toolbar) and select either Delete Backup (the entire backup) or Delete all Backups of <item selected> in the small menu that appears. (Note: You won't see either Delete option if you select a Local Snapshot. Nothing can be deleted from them manually...

You'll see a confirmation prompt, then one for your Administrator's password... If you delete an entire backup, it will disappear from the Timeline and the "cascade" of Finder windows, but it will not actually delete the backup copy of any item that was present at the time of any remaining backup. Thus you may not gain much space. This is usually fairly quick, but sometimes quite lengthy, especially if your backups are on a network {mine were not; I used a direct Firewire connection from the LaCie drive to the laptop}


That's all I did; I selected a single backup folder (the oldest one) from the cascade of Finder windows, selected Delete Backup, and when I came back this morning, ALL the backup folders were gone. I did not follow the advice in the gray box (Deleting Backups via the Finder on Lion 10.7 or later), since pondini said it "is supported, but seems to take longer and often has problems of its own". I've actually used that method before, and had no problem with it. Unfortunately, I decided to listen to pondini...

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User profile for user: John Galt
John Galt
User level: Level 10
141,264 points

Feb 23, 2015 6:33 PM in response to Casey Heeg

Unfortunately, I decided to listen to pondini...


Unfortunately for all of us, Mr. Pondini passed away long before Yosemite was released.


Yosemite incorporated a lot of changes to Time Machine, so it can be expected that some of its previous behavior will have changed. I haven't attempted to duplicate what you did, but I wouldn't have recommended it even prior to Yosemite. I tend to think of it as "no user serviceable parts inside".

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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 8
46,560 points

Feb 24, 2015 3:17 AM in response to Casey Heeg

I know it is confusing. Those instructions are to delete an individual file. What you did was use the Time Machine interface to navigate to a file outside of Time Machine. Yes, it is (or was) a Time Machine backup, but it was not a file being backed up. It was the backup itself. In a better world, you wouldn't even be able to use the Time Machine interface to navigate to Time Machine's own backups. If Pondini were still alive, I'm sure he would clarify that.

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User profile for user: Lexiepex
Lexiepex
User level: Level 6
14,102 points

Feb 24, 2015 3:52 AM in response to Casey Heeg

All these instructions are to delete a specific file !! Even now with Yosemite. You did not do it according to the Pondini instructions.

You should never deleted a dated FOLDER because that is containing all cumulative updates of that moment !!

If you want to delete a specific file you do that by entering TimeMachine, in the displayed finder window navigate to that file and select it then select delete all occurences of the file.

TimeMachine is condensing all backups after a week then after a month to not "eat" too much space.

When TimeMachine becomes short of space it will delete older files and it tells you so.

The Pondini instructions are still valuable, but you must first be sure that you understand the principle of operation of TimeMachine.

Lex


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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 8
46,560 points

Feb 24, 2015 4:15 AM in response to Casey Heeg

I was thinking some more about this. I think I understand how this happened.


When you want to delete a single file or folder using the Time Machine interface, you navigate to the file and tell Time Machine to "Delete all backups". Time Machine then finds the relative path from that backup's root to the file in question. Then, it goes through all backup roots, appends that relative path, and deletes what it finds there. It is pretty simple and straightforward.


But, supposed you use the sidebar and navigate directly to a specific backup root and then perform "Delete all backups"? In that case, the relative path from the backup root to to the backup root (the same folder) is just ".". Then, Time Machines goes through all backup roots, appends that relative path ".", and deletes what it finds there. Unfortunately, in this case, just appending "." creates a path that refers to itself. This would then delete all of your backup root folders. It makes sense. Apple should be looking for a special case of a "." as a backup root and then deleting only that backup root.


What doesn't make sense is why Pondini didn't notice this. We was very thorough. The only logical explanation is that this is a bug that has been introduced to Time Machine after Pondini passed away. I was worried about something like this happening. Now there is no way to update that web site to warn people.


I encourage you to go to Apple's bug reporting site at http://bugreport.apple.com and file a bug report. Feel free to include my analysis above and include a link to this discussion. You will have to register for a free developer account, but that is pretty painless.

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User profile for user: Lexiepex
Lexiepex
User level: Level 6
14,102 points

Feb 24, 2015 4:39 AM in response to etresoft

John, the website is still there, so someone is supporting it. Just after he died, there was someone here in the forum, a acquaintance of him, who said that he was willing to take on the support, but since there were no updates I assume someone in the family is supporting it (may be just pays to keep it alive and not service it).

But the behaviour of deleting one of the TimeMachine dated folders in Finder has always been the wrong way, leading to unhappiness. 😎

Lex

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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 8
46,560 points

Feb 24, 2015 5:24 AM in response to Lexiepex

LexSchellings wrote:


John, the website is still there, so someone is supporting it. Just after he died, there was someone here in the forum, a acquaintance of him, who said that he was willing to take on the support, but since there were no updates I assume someone in the family is supporting it (may be just pays to keep it alive and not service it).

I think someone is just paying for the hosting. I don't know of anyone who knows Time Machine well enough to actually update it.


But the behaviour of deleting one of the TimeMachine dated folders in Finder has always been the wrong way, leading to unhappiness.

I wouldn't recommend any kind of interference with Time Machine, especially with the Finder. But in this case, the Finder would have worked. It was the Time Machine interface itself that exhibits this problem.

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User profile for user: Casey Heeg
Casey Heeg Author
User level: Level 1
0 points

Feb 24, 2015 12:05 PM in response to Casey Heeg

Wow -- thanks for all the comments, folks, I must have struck a nerve! I'll try to respond to all of them here, in sequence:


John Galt: I loved your comment about "no user serviceable parts inside"! It was echoed by etresoft, too, later in the chain; sounds like good advice if this ever happens again. You mentioned that Yosemite incorporated a lot of changes to TM, but I'm not using Yosemite (have been avoiding this upgrade, as it sounds too buggy). But apparently your advice holds with Mavericks, too.


Etresoft (3:17am): very good point -- I think that's exactly what I did. What I'm still not clear on is: are the backup files themselves (ie the actual data being backed up, as opposed to hard links) stored in the backup folder that TM creates, or are they kept in a separate file or folder? It sounds like it's the former, as I had originally thought. But pondini led me to believe that, if the data WAS stored in the folder, it would not be deleted if there were any links to it in future backup folders. From what you said, I'm thinking that's probably true IF you are dealing with a backup that's INSIDE TM, but not if its a folder OUTSIDE TM. Is that right? If so, this really is a pit that's ripe for idiots like me to fall into.


Lex Schellings (3:52am): I don't think I understand your comment -- you said "All these instructions are to delete a specific file... You should never deleted a dated FOLDER". But instruction #2 says "One or more individual backups -- it's best to use Time Machine, per the green box below" -- then, in the green box, it says " Locate the backup or item you want to delete via the Timeline or "cascade" of Finder windows". Since I was trying to delete a "backup", what was I supposed to select, if not a folder?


Etresoft (4:15am): that's an interesting thought, but I don't think I used the sidebar to navigate to the backup I deleted. When I opened TM, it showed me a sequence of Finder windows with the Star Wars background, but the external hard drive in the Finder window was grayed out and inaccessible. So I checked pondini again, and it said I could get to it by right-clicking on the TM icon in the task bar (after exiting TM), selecting 'Browse other TM Disks', and selecting the one I wanted. After I did that, I could see the external hard drive in TM was not gray anymore, and I navigated to the first backup folder. Apparently, that's what took me "outside" of TM, even though I thought I was inside it. I will definitely follow up on your suggestion to go to Apple's bug report site and file a report; thanks!


Lex Schellings (4:39am; do you guys ever sleep?): I didn't hear that pondini had died -- I hope you folks weren't close to him; sounds like he was very thorough, and trying to do the right thing. He just didn't realize there were people like me out there.

I'm surprised at your comment that "the behaviour of deleting one of the TimeMachine dated folders in Finder has always been the wrong way, leading to unhappiness." That is exactly what our tech support department (which is run by Lockheed Martin; they're supposed to know what they're doing -- at least they certainly charge JPL enough for their service) said was the approved way to delete old TM backups, and in several cases in the past, it has worked for me. In any event, I didn't think I was deleting the TM dated folder through Finder -- I thought I was doing it through TM, as pondini recommended. Silly me.


Etresoft (5:24am): It's a little scary that you said "I don't know of anyone who knows Time Machine well enough to actually update it." Were you joking? I definitely agree with your (and John Galt's) advice that "I wouldn't recommend any kind of interference with Time Machine, especially with the Finder". In the future, I think I will just set up a separate partition on my external drive for TM backups, and let TM figure out how to thin itself out.

Lex Schellings (5:43am): "a magic black box" -- that's a very good take-away from this misadventure. Thanks for your advice.


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User profile for user: etresoft
etresoft
User level: Level 8
46,560 points

Feb 24, 2015 2:28 PM in response to Casey Heeg

Casey Heeg wrote:


What I'm still not clear on is: are the backup files themselves (ie the actual data being backed up, as opposed to hard links) stored in the backup folder that TM creates, or are they kept in a separate file or folder? It sounds like it's the former, as I had originally thought. But pondini led me to believe that, if the data WAS stored in the folder, it would not be deleted if there were any links to it in future backup folders. From what you said, I'm thinking that's probably true IF you are dealing with a backup that's INSIDE TM, but not if its a folder OUTSIDE TM. Is that right? If so, this really is a pit that's ripe for idiots like me to fall into.

I wouldn't say you are an idiot. I would say that Apple needs to do more quality assurance. It is confusing to think about it in terms of inside or outside of Time Machine. Time Machine is supposed to let you interact with a virtual view of your data. Instead, it let you access its own data and performed its deletion procedure without actually checking what was being deleted.



That is exactly what our tech support department (which is run by Lockheed Martin; they're supposed to know what they're doing -- at least they certainly charge JPL enough for their service) said was the approved way to delete old TM backups


I used to work for Lockheed Martin et al. I never did much with JPL though. You can find my other software on the big screen at Goddard.


Etresoft (5:24am): It's a little scary that you said "I don't know of anyone who knows Time Machine well enough to actually update it." Were you joking? I definitely agree with your (and John Galt's) advice that "I wouldn't recommend any kind of interference with Time Machine, especially with the Finder". In the future, I think I will just set up a separate partition on my external drive for TM backups, and let TM figure out how to thin itself out.

No joke. I never really shared Pondini's enthusiasm for digging into the innards of Time Machine. I thought the beauty of Time Machine was that it was always there and maintained backups before you realized you needed them. It always seemed to me that the only people who ever had any trouble with it were those who messed with it. (I don't consider your actions to fall into that category though. This is clearly a Time Machine bug.) My opinion was always to just erase Time Machine if it ever started acting up. It is a neat trick to keep years worth of backups, but it really isn't necessary. As a software developer myself, I know what developers test for and what they don't test. I don't want to be the one to test these edge cases for them with my own data.

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User profile for user: Casey Heeg
Casey Heeg Author
User level: Level 1
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Feb 24, 2015 4:00 PM in response to etresoft


I wouldn't say you are an idiot. I would say that Apple needs to do more quality assurance. It is confusing to think about it in terms of inside or outside of Time Machine. Time Machine is supposed to let you interact with a virtual view of your data. Instead, it let you access its own data and performed its deletion procedure without actually checking what was being deleted.

Thank you for treading lightly on my ego... it was meant as a joke, although I'm sure there are plenty of people reading this who think that what I did was pretty idiotic! As you must have found out from working with our colleagues at Goddard, even so-called rocket scientists make their fair share of mistakes...



I used to work for Lockheed Martin et al. I never did much with JPL though. You can find my other software on the big screen at Goddard.

Out of curiosity, what was some of your "other software"? Are you working for Apple now, or are you with another IT company, moonlighting as a good samaritan on this site?


Thanks again for all your help!

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Time machine deleted all my backups instead of the one selected

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