I have been looking for a way to change the scheduling of Time Machine backups. The options in TM Settings are hourly, daily etc. I would find every 3 or 4 hours during the day and maybe once at night more useful.
I have come across the Mac app Shortery that has a wide range of ways to trigger automations:
Just wondering if any Tidbits people have had experience with this app?
I suppose you could rig up your own scheduler. If you do a tmutil disable is will stop all automatic backups. Then you could manually start backups with tmutil startbackup.
Then you could add a custom launchd property list that can call tmutil startbackup at the intervals you require.
FWIW, years ago, an employer used the following snapshot system on their NetApp file server:
Anything older than a month was not accessible via snapshots. If you needed to recover something older, you’d have to contact IT, who could manually retrieve content from their weekly tape backup archive (which went back several years).
See also:
Thank you for the tip.
I created a Shortcut with that Terminal command (shell script) and then created four Shortery Triggers to activate the shortcut four times a day. It seems to be working:
BTW - AU$14.99/year for the Shortery Pro subscription. In view of the multiple ways to trigger shortcuts (see the app link above: Apps, webcam, folder changes, wifi connections, time of day, wake from sleep, login/logout, hotkey, power source, sunrise/sunset, calendar event …) it seems good value!
You could take a look at Lingon - we use this for any scheduled tasks, mostly running Apple or shell scripts.
I’m not a massive fan of the interface but it functions very well and is a cheap, one off purchase. I’m assuming it would be able to run shortcuts but I’ve not tested it.
If you need anything non-trivial, I’d agree. launchd scripts can be very robust, but they’re not easy for a human to create complex ones by hand.
I have used TimeMachineEditor.app for many years to schedule when Time Machine runs. The app dates back to the days when TM ran every hour–or not at all. The app is free.
I am trying out Time Machine Editor. Looking good so far.
Shortery seemed to work at first but failed to trigger the shell script on subsequent days (even though it indicated that the trigger had been activated). Not sure if I have incorrect settings but I thought I may as well try Time Machine Editor. I have cancelled the Shortery free trial (in case I forget to cancel before the subscription starts in a few days).
I may look at Shortery for other tasks but just need Time Machine scheduling for now.
Just a follow up on using Lingon for triggering Shortcuts - yes it definitely works. It even has a Shortcut specific option in the job setup ‘wizard’.
I switched from Lingon to Launch Control $21 several years ago, although I can’t remember why. Certainly worth investigating.
