Safety clone usage

[camner]

I want to make sure I understand how the Safety Clone concept is intended to work....

1. A Safety Clone (SC) is made from a stable system onto a separate partition...and if one chooses "Shared Users and Applications" SD! creates the smallest possible SC by not copying Users or most of the Applications folder.

2. One then boots from the SC from now on

3. If one wishes to install an update (OS update or 3rd party hack) one installs it on the SC

4. If a problem arises, one simply recreates the SC from the main partition via a Smart Update, thus bringing the SC back to the status quo ante

5. If, after a while, it seems clear that no trouble has occured, one then can apply exactly the same update/hack to the main partition. (or, one can "clone back" from the SC, but that's riskier, no?)

Do I have this right?

Now, is there a modification to this that can do the functional equivalent of what I used to do in OS 9, which is to periodically copy and Stuff my System Folder, just in case at some point I wanted to go back to an earlier System Folder. How about this...

Before step 3 above, one creates a clone to an image of the safety clone, which then in effect becomes a "checkpoint" or "rollback point", right? Theoretically, at some later date, if one really wants to roll back to an earlier state, one can use SD! to restore the current SC from the image of the backed up safety clone. Does that work? Does one need to boot from the main partition so one can overwrite the SC?

Thanks for this wonderful product!

[dnanian]

Yes, that can work, as long as you only restore to the Safety Clone, and not to the main drive.

There *is* a way to clone back from the Safety Clone to the main drive. It's for advanced users, though... I wouldn't advise it for everyone...

But, if you wanted to try it, you need to use "Backup - all files" and "Smart Update". You must NOT have created aliases from the original drive to the safety clone yourself.

If that's true, then copying back should work, and will either bring the main system up to date, or roll it back (depending on the state of the safety clone itself).

BE CAREFUL, however.

[camner]

Thanks.

So, to reiterate, what I'm proposing is making "rollback" points of my Safety Clone, so I must just restore to the SC, not to the main partition. This makes sense.

Of course, the alternative is to make complete clones of my main drive and keep images of them around, but that would take LOTS more space, no?

On another subject, I've read somewhere of a recommendation that one install third party apps (ANYTHING outside of what Apple installs in a new OS install) into a user application folder, rather than in the system app folder. Is that really necessary, or is that overkill in your view?

[dnanian]

That's what you're proposing, yes -- and you can do that. You can even use those to clone back to the main drive as I described, but the further forward you get the more nervous I get about doing it.

I don't think you need to install applications into the user folder unless you want to. I'm not terribly didactic about this kind of thing.