Documents MOVED to iCloud

Question

Documents MOVED to iCloud

Wow, I just realized, with the new upgrade to Sierra, my Documents folder was MOVED to iCloud. I thought I did quite a lot of reading about the new upgrade before actually doing it, and I don't recall EVER reading that this would occur. I know it said contents of my desktop would be available on all my devices but I don't recall ever reading that my documents folder would me MOVED. Was this written somewhere in Apple's documentation?

If not, I would like to express my disappointment that Apple would automatically do this rather than make it an option that I could select IF I wanted to do it. I am an Apple fan, I love their products, do all my work on apple products and have all my memories stored in apple products, but I find this lack of disclosure appalling. Was this just a way to get people to sign up for more storage?

There are many reasons I need my design documents, fonts, customer files, stored on my computer rather than in a cloud so I really wish we were given the opportunity to make this selection, rather than have it made for us.

Just needed to vent my disappointment in this issue.

Annette

MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X El Capitan (10.11.6)

Posted on Sep 26, 2016 1:21 PM

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Answer 1

Sep 26, 2016 1:40 PM in response to Csound1

That is the point, "if I turn on documents & data", but it was automatically done for me. My documents were moved. And No, it wasn't clear. I read several blogs from apple and other outside sources and it was never clear. It should have been an option, if I wanted to store all my documents in the cloud, I could. My beef is that the decision was made for us. I sometimes work from a motorhome and don't always have internet connection. So if I'm working remotely and don't have access to my customers files, I'm screwed! I'm just glad today, while I'm in my home office, I happened to notice my icloud storage is almost full, which is why I started looking into this issue and found out my documents were no longer in my computer. So for the past week, my documents haven't been backed up to my desktop hard-drive OR crashplan. Sorry, I don't want to put all my customers documents and my beloved memories, ONLY in the hands of apple!

I really think this was a stupid way of handling this feature.

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Answer 2

Old Toad

Level 10

217,524 points

Sep 26, 2016 2:12 PM in response to annettepeyton

iCloud Drive documents are also stored on the Mac's hard drive in the Users/Home/Library/Mobile Documents folder.

The are accessable from the iCloud Drive icon in the Finder's sidebar:

That way you have access to the even if you don't have an internet connection.

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Answer 3

Old Toad

Level 10

217,524 points

Sep 26, 2016 2:39 PM in response to Csound1

All of my documents open from the iCloud Drive window in the Finder but I put them there myself. I didn't activate the Documents folder in the iCloud preference pane. So that may be why they all open without a problem.

Doing it manually like I did keeps them on the hard drive but in the "invisible" folder in the Library folder. Don't know about the new method but according to what I just read it truly may move them off the HD to the iCloud server. But then I don't know how one would access a file without an internet connection..

Based on this statement:

This moves files back and forth between your Mac and iCloud abased on your usage. This means it only keeps recently opened files on your hard drive when you’re running low on storage,

from this webpage: Clean Your Cluttered Hard Drive with macOS Sierra's New Storage Manager

that tells me that as long as you have sufficient storage you'll have all of your documents on your hard drive. I don't know what free space level the OS will start moving them exclusively to the iCloud servers.

Apple's document doesn't specify the limit either: macOS Sierra: Store your desktop and documents in iCloud Drive. However, it seems to indicate that the files will only be on the iCloud servers:

Download items stored only in iCloud Drive: Control-click the items that you want to download (indicated by the In iCloud status icon ), then choose Download Now. After the items are on your Mac, you can work with them without an Internet connection.

That limits you to having an internet connection in order to access older documents. IMO it's limiting.

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Answer 4

Sep 28, 2016 12:24 PM in response to Old Toad

Search should work even with spotlight or siri - these files are not "hidden", they're "packaged" (like the photo library) - the difference being that you can still find and see the files inside the package if you look in the right place (which shouldn't be this hard).

Stay away from "mobile documents" - that's now a "package" that Apple has deliberately made difficult to get into, because it would be too easy to accidentally mess it up and destroy the icloud syncing process. (That really, truly is the location of your documents, but it's best not to tamper with it directly).
Click the "icloud drive" icon in your finder sidebar, or use the Finder's "Go" menu and choose "icloud drive", or use the command-shift-i keyboard shortcut.
You should now see bunch of folders for all your apps that use iCloud storage, including your "Desktop" and "Documents" folders (slightly renamed, so you know which computer they came from).
Drag your files (not the folders) out of the iCloud "Desktop" and "Documents" folders to someplace else (I recommend putting them in a new folder that you create in your home directory or "Downloads" folder - just as long as it's not in your "documents" or "desktop" - until you get this fully sorted out. You don't want to run in circles). It should warn you that you are about to delete from iCloud and other computers (which is good - deleting from icloud is exactly what you want to do)
If this involves multiple computers, do the same on each.
Go through your system preferences to make sure you have all the icloud and optimized storage settings turned off.
Put a test file on your desktop, make sure it stays there. Make sure it doesn't appear in icloud.
Move your files back to where you want them.

Here's another article that might help, I think it's clearer than the TiDBITs one I posted earlier.

https://derflounder.wordpress.com/2016/09/23/icloud-desktop-and-documents-in-mac os-sierra-the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly/

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Answer 5

Csound1

Level 9

60,093 points

Sep 26, 2016 1:27 PM in response to annettepeyton

I thought it was clear that if you turned Documents and data on your files would be moved, not copied.

Just download them back to your Mac, and turn Documents etc off.

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Answer 6

Sep 26, 2016 1:37 PM in response to annettepeyton

I too would have thought that they would have been synced (like dropbox) to iCloud rather than moved.

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Answer 7

Csound1

Level 9

60,093 points

Sep 26, 2016 1:41 PM in response to think.different

iCloud has always done things its own way, and Dropbox et al have always existed as an alternative way.

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Answer 8

KiltedTim

Level 10

232,390 points

Sep 26, 2016 1:46 PM in response to annettepeyton

The files have not been moved into the cloud. The documents folder was moved into the iCloud drive folder on your Mac. All of the files are still local unless you opted to optimize storage and are low enough on disk space that it's begun to delete the local coped. They are synchronized to iCloud. Copies exist in both places. In addition, if you have other Macs signed in with the same iCloud account and have enabled that option, the files will be synced down to those as well. The files are also available to any iOS devices you have, although they are not automatically synced down to the device due to space limitation.

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Answer 9

Sep 26, 2016 2:06 PM in response to KiltedTim

I did have optimize disk space checked, (also done for me, it was automatically checked) but I have plenty of storage on my mac. When I went to open a file that was normally on my mac, there were no files there. I didn't even have a "Documents" file anymore, I had to re-create one in order to move my files back to my mac.

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Answer 10

Sep 26, 2016 2:12 PM in response to Csound1

I was not using spotlight.

I just tryed to open a document that I had been working on last week in Adobe Indesign and the path is broken, indicating that the file is gone or has been moved. It says the file is missing. If there was a copy there, it would have opened.

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Answer 11

Sep 26, 2016 2:24 PM in response to annettepeyton

Nothing has been removed from your macbook. You just have to look in the right place (the "icloud drive" co-exists locally on your mac and in the cloud - so if you go into "airplane mode" you still have full access to all your files, they'll just sync up any changes when you reconnect to the network).

Read "Explaining Sierra's Optimized Storage" on TidBITS for an excellent overview of how icloud and optimized storage work, with warnings.

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Answer 12

Sep 26, 2016 2:49 PM in response to Joseph Delaney

So, in the article it says

When enabled via the Storage Management window of System Information or the master switch at System Preferences > iCloud > iCloud Drive > Options, this feature moves your Desktop and Documents folders from your home folder to iCloud Drive (itself a chimerical folder/volume). Don’t look for them in your home folder because they’re gone —

???

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Answer 13

Sep 26, 2016 2:52 PM in response to Joseph Delaney

Also from the article,

In fact, what happens when you turn off that feature is that Sierra recreates empty Desktop and Documents folders in your home folder. You can’t replace those, so you can’t drag the old Desktop and Documents folders from iCloud Drive to your home folder; instead, you must open each folder in iCloud Drive and move (Command-drag) its contents to the local Desktop and Documents folders in your home folder. You can try to delete the now-empty Desktop and Documents folders from iCloud Drive, but in my experience, iCloud keeps recreating at least the Desktop folder.

So if you have to MOVE files back to their original location on your mac, that tells me they are not in icloud if you turn off Documents & desktop in your icloud settings.

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Answer 14

Sep 26, 2016 3:00 PM in response to Old Toad

Yes, I can get to some of the documents using that path. However, in the PATH, it says, icloud - documents, etc. That still indicates to me that those are in the cloud, not on my mac. Am I missing something?

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Answer 15

Sep 26, 2016 3:46 PM in response to Csound1

I've spent long enough on this and I don't seem to be getting anywhere. I appreciate everyone's help, however, from all indications, my files were moved from my computer to icloud. I understand when you say to look in the Mobile documents folder, the icloud folder, etc. Yes, my files were in those folders, but my documents folder was gone from my hard drive. Even when I look in an old time machine backup, the files that used to be backed up from the documents folder from my hard drive, were not present in a backup from a couple days ago. There was no documents folder on the hard drive backup. I've unchecked optimized storage in preferences and moved my files back to my mac. Seems like everything is back to where it was. I hope someone from apple reads this, as I'm still very disappointed that I didn't have a say in this. Or if I'm missing something, you've made it too complicated for the average mac user to understand. I read the article that was linked in an above post and it indicated that files were moved, not synced between devices, so again, if I'm missing something, it's way to complicated for the average mac user.

Thanks everyone

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