Backing up a moderately large library

I just got a new external hard drive and am backing up key installers and files so that I could do a clean install if needed with a minimum amount of hassle. I noticed the Logos4 folder in my Library/Application Support folder is just under 14.3 GB. If I need to do a clean install, I really don't want to have to download all this again.

I could back this folder up to the external hard drive (perhaps as a g-zipped tar file.) I couldn't find anything on the Logos site about backing up and restoring an installation with lots of data.

I must admit that I am appalled by the amount of data the Logos 4 software downloads. There must be a way to make effective use of bandwidth.

Is there a "best practices" document for backing up a library for Logos4 Mac?

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Comments

Jacob Hantla

Logos is not designed to be easily backed up by the user. There is likely a way to be able to do it, but in order to maintain synced, up-to-date libraries that are not prone to loss in the case of computer failure, Logos has designed a system that doesn't need to be backed up by the user.

I do not know the way one would go about making local copies of resources on a mac in order to minimize download size of a reinstall.

John Minter

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/207656#Comment_207656

I really HOPE Logos has thought of a way to backup a library. 14.3 GB is a LOT to download - that is almost three full DVDs. Up to now my ISP has not put download quotas, but too many users doing this will cause that to stop. Even an out-of-date backup would be better than downloading everything all over again...

Kevin Becker

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/207709#Comment_207709

John, check out this wiki page: http://wiki.logos.com/Quick_Installation_onto_Multiple_Macs it should give you some ideas about backing up Logos files to avoid some downloads in the future.

Jack Caviness

I just got a new external hard drive and am backing up key installers and files

Since you posted this question on the L4 Mac forum, I assume you are a Mac user. How large is the external drive? Why not just use Time Machine?

I had a failure from a recent L4 Resource Update. I was able to recover by restoring the entire Logos 4 folder from a week earlier and then installing the latest version of L4 Mac. I could then avoid the resource I had determined to be corrupted. I was then back in business without having to wait for the next Beta. I back up everything except my Parallels Virtual Machines, and my oldest backup is from March 2009.

Do you need any additional information?

PS: My Logos Library is a little larger than yours (17.74 GB for the Logos 4 folder in Application Support).

Keep Smiling 4 Jesus :)

External hard drive possibility - partition into 2 - install Mac OS X and key installers with files into one partition - setup Time Machine in the other (larger size allows more hourly increment backup files to be kept).

Time Machine information => http://www.apple.com/macosx/what-is-macosx/time-machine.html and http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1427 (added links to Wiki)

Observation: Logos 4 indexes can be completely rebuilt so could exclude them from Time Machine backup, forum http://community.logos.com/forums/p/17881/134532.aspx#134532 may be helpful.

When booting up a Mac, hold option key until a list of bootable partitions appear (internal, optical, and external) - click on desired partition to boot up.

Mac OS X installation (or User Migration Assistant) can restore user applications and files from Time Machine backup (easy to upgrade Mac computers).

Complete restore from Time Machine backup => http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.5/en/15638.html

Keep Smiling [:)]

John Minter

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/207724#Comment_207724

Thanks, Kevin. That was just what I needed. Stored the required files and instructions on my external drive.

Both Jack and Keep Smiling 4 Jesus mentioned Time Machine. I actually have Time Machine backups on our Time Capsule/AirPort Extreme router. Never actually done a system restore. This external hard drive is designed for an extra level of backup and for the case where I really want to do a clean install. My MacBook Pro actually came with Leopard and was upgraded to Snow Leopard. It has some peculiarities with some scientific packages that I use that make me think that at some point it would be wise to wipe the drive and do a clean install of Snow Leopard and carefully rebuild the system. In that case i do not want to do a system restore. I set the second external drive up to allow me to do this manually. It is also nice to have a bootable partition with the installer. My son has a similar setup for his MacBook and it saved my bacon when I needed to use DiskUtility to repair my hard drive while on vacation at his house.

Thanks to all for your help. Happy New Year!

Keep Smiling 4 Jesus :)

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/207845#Comment_207845

My MacBook Pro actually came with Leopard and was upgraded to Snow Leopard. It has some peculiarities with some scientific packages that I use that make me think that at some point it would be wise to wipe the drive and do a clean install of Snow Leopard and carefully rebuild the system.

Can do a clean install of Snow Leopard - have option to copy user applications and/or files from Time Machine backup (as part of install or later using User Migration Assistant - successfully used both methods last month).

Option: can boot Mac OS X installer - use disk utility to copy (restore) internal partition to an external partition (different than installer) - verify can boot Mac using external partition - then boot installation disk, format internal partition and do a clean install, followed by careful rebuilding. If needed, can boot previous configuration from external partition (also helpful if happen to want a file during rebuilding process).

Thankful Apple's Disk Utility can split a partition into 2 (provided files already in a partition fit in resized space).

Keep Smiling [:)] + Happy New Year [*]

Jack Caviness

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/207845#Comment_207845

I actually have Time Machine backups on our Time Capsule/AirPort Extreme router. Never actually done a system restore.

I have never done a system restore either, but I find Time Machine to be a superb incremental backup solution. I did a complete restore of L4 Mac because I had not yet identified the specific part of the resource update that was causing the crash. Time Machine only took about 12 minutes (maybe less) to restore the 17.75 GB folder.