Repairing permissions in SuperDuper!?
AES
Leopard, the Repair Permissions step in SuperDuper! Smart Updates, which
used to take only a minute or so, has been taking _much_ longer than
this -- up to 30+ minutes for an internal HD with about 70 GB total on
it.
There's a thread about this on the SuperDuper! forum
<http://www.shirt-pocket.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4039>
in which a Shirt Pocket staffer says that you do NOT routinely need to
repair permissions during a backup, and the default behavior in fact is
not to do so.
Since I've been using SuperDuper! since 2005 and repairing permissions
every time, I guess I just need a little reassurance that this is OK.
Anyone have any reason to contradict this? (And any clear reason why
this happens with Leopard, but not TIger?)
[I'm going to ask about this on the forum also, but it's taking a while
for my registration to get through the "moderation queue".]
[Guess it says something about the quality of SuperDuper! that this is
the first time in 5 years of steady use that I've even had a need to
know that a forum for it existed.]
nospam
AES <sie...@stanford.edu> wrote:
> in which a Shirt Pocket staffer says that you do NOT routinely need to
> repair permissions during a backup, and the default behavior in fact is
> not to do so.
>
> Since I've been using SuperDuper! since 2005 and repairing permissions
> every time, I guess I just need a little reassurance that this is OK.
> Anyone have any reason to contradict this? (And any clear reason why
> this happens with Leopard, but not TIger?)
there's very rarely a need to repair permissions at all and certainly
not during a backup.
Nick Naym
sie...@stanford.edu wrote on 8/25/10 11:30 PM:
> Ever since I recently upgraded a several year old MacBook from Tiger to
> Leopard, the Repair Permissions step in SuperDuper! Smart Updates, which
> used to take only a minute or so, has been taking _much_ longer than
> this -- up to 30+ minutes for an internal HD with about 70 GB total on
> it.
>
> There's a thread about this on the SuperDuper! forum
>
> <http://www.shirt-pocket.com/forums/showthread.php?t=4039>
>
> in which a Shirt Pocket staffer says that you do NOT routinely need to
> repair permissions during a backup, and the default behavior in fact is
> not to do so.
That "staffer" is Dave Nanian. (I'd know that sight-unseen, as -- except for
an occasional user -- Dave is the only one who fields questions.) He founded
Shirt Pocket, and runs the online support operation. More-responsive (and
more-knowledgeable) product support you're unlikely to find elsewhere.
>
> Since I've been using SuperDuper! since 2005 and repairing permissions
> every time, I guess I just need a little reassurance that this is OK.
> Anyone have any reason to contradict this? (And any clear reason why
> this happens with Leopard, but not TIger?)
>
> [I'm going to ask about this on the forum also, but it's taking a while
> for my registration to get through the "moderation queue".]
>
> [Guess it says something about the quality of SuperDuper! that this is
> the first time in 5 years of steady use that I've even had a need to
> know that a forum for it existed.]
--
iMac (27", 3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 4 GB RAM, 1 TB HDD) € OS X (10.6.3)
Jim_Higgins
Thanks for the question, and to those who responded thank you too. I've
often wondered about this but never got around to asking. My backups
will take much less time now :-) :-)
--
Service Guarantees Citizenship
Fred Moore
nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
Okay, AES, you just HAVE to start a flame war do ya?!? ;)
I have directly and personally seen bad permissions bring a Mac to a
grinding halt, cause data loss, and give the user a bloody nose and
hemorrhoids. While this has become less frequent with 10.5, it still
can/does happen. This phenomenon was just documented in these pages in
the last few months, yet again.
I tell my clients to repair permissions _before_ any backup so that we
are sure the backup is as high quality as possible. (Leaky life rafts
aren't particularly useful or reassuring.) Permissions can and do get
fatally corrupted during computer use, with the noted exception that it
seems to be happening less with 10.5 and later. I also recommend
repairing permissions _after_ any software update. This especially
applies to Adobe products, but even some of Apple's updates leave
mis-set perms. Go figure. Get a cup of coffee or use the loo to fill in
the few minutes the repair takes.
You are, of course, free to do what you like. It's your data. As
mentioned, this topic is akin to a religious war, so your salvation, as
well as mileage, may vary.
nospam
Fred Moore <fmo...@gcfn.org> wrote:
> I have directly and personally seen bad permissions bring a Mac to a
> grinding halt, cause data loss, and give the user a bloody nose and
> hemorrhoids. While this has become less frequent with 10.5, it still
> can/does happen. This phenomenon was just documented in these pages in
> the last few months, yet again.
specifics? it is *extremely* unlikely that a permission issue caused a
mac to grind to a halt and have data loss.
> I tell my clients to repair permissions _before_ any backup so that we
> are sure the backup is as high quality as possible. (Leaky life rafts
> aren't particularly useful or reassuring.) Permissions can and do get
> fatally corrupted during computer use, with the noted exception that it
> seems to be happening less with 10.5 and later.
nonsense. permissions do not get corrupted in normal use. some
installers might alter permissions (which itself is not always a
problem) but in general, it does not matter.
permission repair is not really 'repair' it's merely resetting things
to what apple thinks it should be, which is not necessarily the only
valid choice. repairing permissions might fix an occasional problem but
it's generally a waste of time.
> I also recommend
> repairing permissions _after_ any software update. This especially
> applies to Adobe products, but even some of Apple's updates leave
> mis-set perms. Go figure. Get a cup of coffee or use the loo to fill in
> the few minutes the repair takes.
that's one scenario where things may (but not often) get screwed up,
but that doesn't justify repairing permissions prior to every backup
(which should be daily).
Richard Maine
> permission repair is not really 'repair' it's merely resetting things
> to what apple thinks it should be, which is not necessarily the only
> valid choice. repairing permissions might fix an occasional problem but
> it's generally a waste of time.
It can be worse than a waste of time. It can actually break things by
setting the permissions incorrectly. Nothing divinely guarantees that
the permisions that "repair permissions" sets will be the right ones.
Yes, they ought to be. But then so should the permissions that the files
have in the first place. If something has changed the file permissions
with good reason, or if something corrupted the "repair permisions" data
without such good reason, then the result will be a classic case of
"fixing" something that wasn't broken (at least not before the "fix".)
--
Richard Maine | Good judgment comes from experience;
email: last name at domain . net | experience comes from bad judgment.
domain: summertriangle | -- Mark Twain
Suze
nos...@see.signature (Richard Maine) wrote:
> nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>
> > permission repair is not really 'repair' it's merely resetting things
> > to what apple thinks it should be, which is not necessarily the only
> > valid choice. repairing permissions might fix an occasional problem but
> > it's generally a waste of time.
>
> It can be worse than a waste of time. It can actually break things by
> setting the permissions incorrectly. Nothing divinely guarantees that
> the permisions that "repair permissions" sets will be the right ones.
> Yes, they ought to be. But then so should the permissions that the files
> have in the first place. If something has changed the file permissions
> with good reason, or if something corrupted the "repair permisions" data
> without such good reason, then the result will be a classic case of
> "fixing" something that wasn't broken (at least not before the "fix".)
Not to mention that Apple says there's a whole crapload of permission
errors that evidently should be ignored.
http://support.apple.com/kb/ts1448
--
A celibate clergy is an especially good idea,
because it tends to suppress any hereditary propensity toward fanaticism.
Carl Sagan
Jolly Roger
nos...@see.signature (Richard Maine) wrote:
> nospam <nos...@nospam.invalid> wrote:
>
> > permission repair is not really 'repair' it's merely resetting things
> > to what apple thinks it should be, which is not necessarily the only
> > valid choice. repairing permissions might fix an occasional problem but
> > it's generally a waste of time.
>
> It can be worse than a waste of time. It can actually break things by
> setting the permissions incorrectly. Nothing divinely guarantees that
> the permisions that "repair permissions" sets will be the right ones.
> Yes, they ought to be. But then so should the permissions that the files
> have in the first place. If something has changed the file permissions
> with good reason, or if something corrupted the "repair permisions" data
> without such good reason, then the result will be a classic case of
> "fixing" something that wasn't broken (at least not before the "fix".)
Yep. In fact, there's a huge design flaw in the way Repair Permissions
reads receipts to determine what the "proper" permissions should be: If
more than one receipt contains the same file/folder with differing
permissions or ownership, the result of running Repair Permissions is
undefined. The file/folder in question may have one or the other
owner/permission set simply depending on the order in which the receipts
were processed! Bad news.
Also, it's important to keep in mind that Repair Permissions "fixes" the
ownership and permissions only of those files/folders specifically
mentioned in existing receipts on your computer at the time. And it
excludes anything in your home directory (all of your Documents, an so
on).
--
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JR