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how to tell when backing up to time machine is done?

Back in the day the back up icon used to spin when in use, now it just sits there and I swear it never let's me know when the back up is finished. It always says in progress

iMac 27″ 5K, macOS 10.14

Posted on Oct 14, 2021 11:42 AM

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Posted on Oct 14, 2021 1:06 PM

If TM is actively backing up, the menubar icon has two arrowheads:



The "Preparing Backup" status can last a long time if you've not backed up in a while. Likewise, if your backup drive is a slow USB1 or USB22 model, things will be slow.

6 replies

Oct 14, 2021 5:40 PM in response to VikingOSX

VikingOSX wrote:

Allan,

Apple has redesigned the Time Machine icon to look like the following in macOS 11.6:

https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/109ff44c-dd80-4bab-947f-ecb34be7cc2f

and the best way to know when it has really finished is by clicking the preceding icon to see the following status report:


https://discussions.apple.com/content/attachment/51a92ccf-de9d-4f9c-91f8-f8405d142505

Out of town, so could not do these captures from my 2013 iMac still running Mojave.

Yes, I know. OP does appears to be running Mojave:

Out of town, so could not do these captures from my 2013 iMac still running Mojave.


Ain't that a pain! I keep a lot of my oft-used screenies in Dropbox, but too often I don't have the right ones when on the road!



Oct 15, 2021 11:49 AM in response to Allan Jones

I haven't done it for screenshots, but all of my various scripts and compilable code is stored in titular directories on iCloud in an outer Code folder. So, when on the road, I have access to that Code folder via iCloud Drive in the Finder sidebar and in the Terminal application via:


mkdir -p ~/iDrive ~/Code
ln -s /Users/$USER/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs /Users/$USER/iDrive
ln -s /Users/$USER/Library/Mobile\ Documents/com~apple~CloudDocs/Code /Users/$USER/Code


and both of these iCloud Drive folders show up locally on my Mac as:


how to tell when backing up to time machine is done?

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