BACKUP MAC TO ICLOUD USING TIME MACHINE SOFTWARE

Client/server software has gotten far more sophisticated over the decades, with features like local caching that ensure documents will be accessible at times when an internet connection is not available. The only fundamental difference between 'the cloud' and traditional corporate servers is the physical location of the server (somewhere in the same office building vs. While I can't say, 'I don't understand why people have a problem with this.', I am amused by people's resistance to a model of client/server computing that's been around since there have been corporate document servers (which is nearly forever). In other words, by doing things the way you prefer, you're ignoring potentially useful features of working in the cloud. If you directly work on the document(s) in the iCloud Drive folder, rather than copy a 'finished' document into iCloud drive, then changes are automatically saved. However, you're making more work for yourself. You have cloud storage, you place a document in cloud storage. then there's nothing fundamentally wrong with doing this. If it helps you to think of it as a 'backup' and if you do not use iCloud Drive as a way of accessing/syncing documents across multiple devices. It is like having an time-machine online. If you're really looking for an online backup service that works very well, I would suggest BackBlaze. They work much better on this aspect when compared with iCloud but still this is not a bulletproof backup solution. Same applies with Dropbox and most others cloud storage services. If you're an MS Office user, you can use OneDrive (1TB space, that's great!) to make an online only folder that you can sync with your HD work folder again through a third-party app. There are ways to make sure that these two folders are synced between them (Hazel app can do that, and it is amazingly powerful) but this arrangement will keep using space on your local HD and it is not recommended as a backup. This is not a particularly good arrangement for a backup and can mess up things for you pretty easily. Another problem is that you'll end up having two copies of the same folders in your HD, one that will sync with iCloud and one that will stay offline.

The problem is that you have no control over which files/folders will be kept online only. That said, if you setup an iCloud folder in your HD and choose the option 'optimise storage' in settings, the icloud will keep some of the files/folders online only.

I’m staring by saying that it is not possible to keep a folder online only in iCloud that will not sync with a folder in your local HD. Thanks in advance for the help - it is strangely difficult to find detailed information about iCloud Drive on Apple's website.

Is there anything wrong about my logic here or how iCloud Drive works? I assume others are talking about the scenario where you are actually opening files from iCloud Drive as your only working copy.Īs a follow-up question, if I have these backup folders on my iCloud Drive, do they automatically get downloaded to my MacBook's hard drive (meaning I would have two local copies) or is that only if I start opening files from that folder? But I don't intend to actually USE those files on iCloud Drive. That way they are on there if something happens to my laptop. Periodically, I'll make a copy of my documents and put them in a backup folder on iCloud drive. But the way I would primarily like to use it is as follows: On the hard drive of my Macbook Air, I keep all of my 'working files' that I actually use. I have seen a lot of posts stating that iCloud Drive is a sync system, not a backup system.

Backup mac to icloud using time machine