No Space Left / Erase, then Copy
 

Hello.

I bought SuperDuper! six years ago and all the updates have been free, so I feel a bit greedy asking for anything more but...

I often run out of space on the destination volume because deletes are deferred until the copies are successfully complete. Clearly this is the safest policy but I wish I could override it sometimes.

If there were an SDpro, with a checkbox to "before you start copying/replacing, first delete the files that need to be deleted" I'd buy it in a heartbeat. If it were crazy clever it would just delete the files it needs to, in order to maintain enough free space for the next copy/replace as it moves along.

I know this has been discussed before but I thought now might be a good time to bring it up again.

Regards,

Brian

Thanks for the suggestion. Definitely something I want to see, it's just a matter of getting it implemented and tested, which isn't always easy.

I guess that explains why I get that message trying to exclude my Music/iTunes folder.
My source is 442 GB and target is 401 GB.

Music/iTunes is 275 GB
SuperDuper! copied the Music/iTunes folder first each time and failed with "No Space Left" error.

Well, no - if you've excluded that folder, we're not going to copy it.

Dave

I guess I did not read the User's Guide correctly.
I did not do something right?
04:43:55 AM | Info | Ignoring /Users/larco/Music/iTunes/iTunes Music
| 04:46:11 AM | Info | Unable to preallocate target file /Volumes/MBP11-SD/Users/larco/Music/iTunes/Mobile Applications/Tiger 12 1.0.8.ipa due to error: 28, No space left on device
| 04:46:11 AM | Info | Error copying /Users/larco/Music/iTunes/Mobile Applications/Tiger 12 1.0.8.ipa to /Volumes/MBP11-SD/Users/larco/Music/iTunes/Mobile Applications/Tiger 12 1.0.8.ipa of type 8 due to error 28
| 04:46:11 AM | Error | SDCopy: Error copying /Users/larco/Music/iTunes/Mobile Applications/Tiger 12 1.0.8.ipa to /Volumes/MBP11-SD/Users/larco/Music/iTunes/Mobile Applications/Tiger 12 1.0.8.ipa of type 8 due to error 28: No space left on device

Yes, it looks like you didn't exclude the folder properly.

My backup just failed due to low space on the destination drive. :(

PRE-COPY DELETION IS AN ESSENTIAL FUNCTION!
I was unaware SD wasn't erasing first.

SD is a veteran app, so it's been around plenty long enough for the dev's to have gotten off their butts and fixed this glaring omission. :mad:

Since the destination is the same size as the source, there's no reason it shouldn't have enough space - everything on the source must always fit on the destination.
Now that I've wasted a half hour posting this, I must waste more of my time doing SD's job and manually deleting files. If I have to do SD's job, I should get a discount.

And don't give me the lame excuse you posted SIX MONTHS AGO, because CCC has been doing this for years! Are the developer's really that incompetent? If so, S-P better hire some new ones!

Thanks for your feedback on our features and competence, Rebel.

I call 'em as I see 'em. :p

Outstanding and extremely valuable application
 

Dave, SuperDuper is the most valuable software product I have ever purchased. It has saved me numerous times and I have recommended it to many Mac users. In addition, your prompt and competent support reflects so very favorably on you and your extensive knowledge. It is a shame that some people can never be satisfied with your outstanding product and support. Many thanks for all your efforts.

Well, I have no problem with people "never being satisfied", because, frankly, I'm never satisfied either. :)

There are pros and cons to everything. The downside to deleting files first on the destination before the copy is that for a short time (minutes to hours) this leaves you with no viable clone of those files, and if something happens to the original before the new clone completes, conceivably one could be left without any copy of them at all. [Having multiple backups helps alleviate this ...] While I'm sure the expert who posted in bold, red, underline font would no doubt never allow this to happen, I can see the numerous new posts from others saying, "why didn't you warn me this could happen," etc.

Disk storage is very cheap nowadays and getting a disk to make the clone destination large enough (just as one must do for use with Time Machine) is an easy solution.

My sense is that the "developers" and the one guy who politely responds to all queries (including those in bold, red, underline fonts) in this Forum are one and the same. Hiring more "developers" to add these extra options would require raising the price of the product, no doubt leading to more bold, red, underline complaints.

As my destination volume has approached capacity I've started running into this as well. It's certainly annoying to have to go find something on the destination disk that is about large enough to delete. The goal being to allow the clone to complete without having to re-copy too much still-identical data needlessly in order to replace the files I manually deleted.

Given the thread's history, I should note that in spite of this inconvenience I am still an ardent Super-Duper! supporter. That said, if it were possible for Super-Duper to be building a "pending-delete" queue of files as it is copying, and to resort to this list in the event that the next copy would cause the destination to run out of room, I feel like that would be ideal. I realize that properly paralleling this is no small task, but this would be my number 1 feature request--because everything else is darn near perfect already.

I sympathize with the argument that preemptively deleting leaves your backup in a temporarily inconsistent state, but I'd much prefer that state to be temporary (during the clone process) than permanent (because the entire cloning process has failed!) And it could be argued, if you wanted to go a little overboard, that really you should have a third copy of your data somewhere else already so that a failure in the current backup process can not result in data loss. (Say for example, a second SuperDuper destination disk that is in rotation with the first one, or a separate TimeMachine volume.) The truly paranoid among us treat even "backing up" as a potentially destructive process. ;)

Understood. Might I suggest, in the meantime, that a larger backup drive is an affordable and safe intermediate step?

I appreciate your point, but it's maybe not actually always practical. I have a 1tb internal disk (source), and a 3tb external drive partitioned in a 1tb/2tb split to accommodate a 1-1 SuperDuper clone and a larger Time Machine volume. A larger disk is probably warranted, but that's going to cost at least $150 these days. (And you definitely can't argue that it isn't cheaper to come whine about new features here!)

Anyway, I guess it depends on your situation but a new disk is not necessarily affordable for everyone. There are many benefits to that investment though, no argument there.