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I am trying to clear some space from from Macbook Pro and wondered if the files in the iCloud folder I can see in Finder are locally stored or if they are just 'mirroring' what is on the cloud? When I delete a file from that folder it says it deletes from the cloud too.
Ideally I would like to have the files on the cloud but not on my Mac. Is there a way to do this?
Thanks!
MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch,Early 2015), iOS 10.2
Time Machine is backing up the files that are mirrored on your Mac and have local shadow copies. Basically - all documents you can access on iCloud Drive, if you are offline and not connected to the Internet. These shadow copies are in a hidden folder in your user library and Time Machine can restore them.
On Sierra, with "Optimize" enabled, these shadow copies of older documents and data will be purged, if storage is needed. And then Time Machine can no longer back them up. I do not "Optimize" for iCloud Drive or my Photos Library, because I want to be able to access all files locally and want a Time Machine backup.
You can see this in the System Preferences > iCloud > iCloud Drive > Options:
Time Machine is backing up the files that are mirrored on your Mac and have local shadow copies. Basically - all documents you can access on iCloud Drive, if you are offline and not connected to the Internet. These shadow copies are in a hidden folder in your user library and Time Machine can restore them.
On Sierra, with "Optimize" enabled, these shadow copies of older documents and data will be purged, if storage is needed. And then Time Machine can no longer back them up. I do not "Optimize" for iCloud Drive or my Photos Library, because I want to be able to access all files locally and want a Time Machine backup.
You can see this in the System Preferences > iCloud > iCloud Drive > Options:
léonie, I think you said it in your reply just now, but just wanted to clarify: Time Machine does NOT backup documents saved to iCloud Drive? I think you differentiated between "optimized" documents. Previously, when I was not using iCloud Drive, Time Machine backups were very useful to providing easy access to older version of Excel and Word files, which I sometimes need for comparison purposes. If my files are now on iCloud Drive, does Time Machine back these up where i can easily access previous versions of Excel or Word files? Thank you, rGin
As Eric said - iCloud is primarily a syncing system on El Capitan and Yosemite - on Sierra this has changed a bit. The central storage place is iCloud and your documents and data are updated across all devices., so you can alway access them from any device you own and they are in sync.
how does this local storage work? One of the purposes of iCloud is to provide extra storage.
iCloud provides extra storage for the mobile devices (iPhone, iPad, iPod) with very much local storage. You can download from iCloud, but the local copies of older documents will automatically removed.
Content in iCloud is not included in the iCloud backups of mobile devices.
On a Mac iCloud Drive has hidden shadow copies in your user library. And these copies are included in the Time Machine backup. You cannot avoid the local shadow copies on Yosemite and El Capitan.
On macOS Sierra you can use iCloud Drive and your Desktop Folder and Documents folder on a Mac as a storage extension like on iOS devices, if you use "optimize" and include your Desktop and Documents folder in iCloud Drive. Then older shadow copies will be purged and you need an internet connection to be able to work with documents and data you have not used in a long time.
Time Machine backups do not include the optimized documents and data. You have to download them regularly to an external backup drive to have a local backup.
Ideally I would like to have the files on the cloud but not on my Mac. Is there a way to do this?
Which version of macOS are you running?
With Yosemite and El Capitan all files on iCloud Drive are mirrored on your Mac, so you can work with them, if you are not connected to the Internet. The iCloud Drive files will also be backed up by Time Machine this way.
With macOS Sierra you are having the Optimize option for iCloud Drive, your Desktop folder, and your Documents folder.. Then your mac will remove older files from your Mac if more storage is needed and keep them only in iCloud.
how does this local storage work? One of the purposes of iCloud is to provide extra storage. If I have 500 GB in iCloud, but only a 250 GB drive on my laptop, how are the iCloud docs stored locally?
I think I've also read that iCloud docs are not backed up by Timemachine. If this is the case iCloud is the only copy so if I corrupt or accidentally delete, seems I'm out of luck. Or am I missing something?
You can access the local cloud drive by going to ~/Library/Mobile Documents/
Just open a finder window, and press Shift + Control + G and paste in "~/Library/Mobile Documents/" without the quotes.
That will open the locally stored iCloud Drive. You can also add that to the doc via this trick:
With a finder window active, press Shift + Control + G and paste in the following:
/System/Library/CoreServices/Finder.app/Contents/Applications/
You'll see a couple of other core Finder apps there which can also be added to your Dock.
Regarding your other question about deleting only the Cloud stored files, typically you wouldn't be able to do that. The iCloud drive is setup so that anything stored locally syncs to the cloud, and anything in the cloud, syncs locally, so deleting from one would delete from the other. I suppose you could always try clicking the local file and right clicking it, and selecting the "lock" option from the File Info window. (with the file highlighted, press Command + I and select the "Locked" checkbox). Note that I haven't tried this and there's no guarantee that it still wouldn't delete both copies, or sync the file right back to the cloud.
Thank you. I'm running Yosemite. So that means the files in the cloud are also being stored locally? Or not? Can I alter that?
Sorry - I'm a beginner!!
They are all stored locally and you can't alter that.
iCloud is a syncing system, not an external storage system. If you delete them from the device/computer they will be deleted from iCloud.
Ah that's a shame, I was hoping iCloud behaved like Dropbox or Google Drive where you can access files in the cloud but you don't need to have locally stored files.
Thanks for clearing that up.
Are iCloud files stored locally?
