Time Machine won't exclude VM (or anything at all)

[lensv]

Hi!

I have a fresh install of Mac OS Catalina where VMware Fusion 11.5 is installed. As usual I have configured Time Machine to exclude the folder where I keep my virtual machines (and a few other folders). The problem now is that TM seems to fail with this exclusion. Everything is still there when I enter the backup. I have tried several times to remove all settings, delete the backup and to delete the .plist file as well, but nothing changes.

The system has one admin account and one standard user, the account that I actually use. It has FileVault turned on and the backup target is a shared folder on another Mac. Any ideas why this occurs? May it be a bug?

/LS

[wila]

Hi LS,

Can you tell us where your virtual machines live?

If you look at that file location via the terminal does it end with ".localized" perhaps?

--

Wil

[lensv]

Hi there!

I'm not at the machine right now, but the VM folder is located in my user's home directory (as well as the other intended excluded folders).

/LS

[wila]

Hi,

Will need the exact location or screenshot via Finder to confirm my suspicion of what is going on.

If you'd rather not share that on here then you can send it to me by email. I know you have my email address

If I'm understanding it correctly the problem is only with VMware Fusion virtual machines?

--

Wil

[yodane]

I have the same issue

[wila]

Hi,

OK, are your VMs in the folder : /Users/<username>/Documents/Virtual Machines.localized

by any chance?

If so, move your virtual machines out of the Documents folder into a new folder you name yourself.

eg.

for example, if your <username> is yodane.

/Users/yodane/Virtual Machines

(note the no ".localized" part)

Also note that when you open the moved VM in VMware Fusion that you have to answer "move" on the question: "Did you move or copy this virtual machine".

This is important as otherwise you will likely have to re-activate a Windows Virtual Machine that you just moved.

more details here: Re: vmware virtual machine exclusion from time machine on an iMac

--

Wil

[lensv]

He he,

My first thought was actually to contact you directly (but I didn't really want to put too much load on you).

Unfortunately this behaviour seems to be general. It not only affects VMware Fusion virtual machines. If I understand it right others seem to have the same problem as well...

/LS

*EDIT: My excluded folders are located directly under my user's home folder, not under Documents. The only difference to your example is that my folder names start with an underscore (e.g. _Virtual Machines).

[wila]

Hi,

Can you check if it is a .localized version of the folder?

(See the link in my reply to the other user reporting the same)

--

Wil

[yodane]

Yes, it is a .localized version

So, just moving up to the root directory should work?

Also, I run with 7 desktops open and ever since upgrading to OS Catalina both my VM's, (one is XP and the other Win 10), which I put in full screen mode and move XP left between desktop 3 and 4  and leave Win 10 to the right of desktop 7 move uncommanded to the left one space and sometimes either XP or both XP and Win 10 shut down uncommanded. This is really annoying and I suspect I need to open another ticket to this problem.

[lensv]

Wil!

In my case .localized don't seem to be the problem. I just sent you a screenshot by mail...

/LS

[wila]

Hi yodane,

It is best to keep it under the user, create a new folder there.

The reason for that is that I have seen reports where upgrading macOS to Catalina cleared everything directly under root, so I advice to at least not put a folder directly under root.

For your other problem, please create a new post as otherwise things tend to get confusing pretty fast.

--

Wil

[ColoradoMarmot]

One related note - Time Machine now uses snapshots in Catalina, so it only excludes the files from moving to the backup drive itself - there is no way to exclude a folder from local backups since snapshots are at the volume level.  That means that if you use time machine, but run disconnected from your actual disk, your local drive can fill up fast.  It's supposed to purge free space, but often doesn't do so quickly enough if you're copying large files.  It also means that Finder reports incorrect (and in some cases, impossible, free disk space).

[HurcoMv]

I had a similar issue with TM backing up my VM's after the Catalina upgrade, even though I had the VM folders excluded. I was able to resolve the issue by deleting the exclusions and then adding exclusions based on the VM sparse bundle name itself (clicked on the bundle name). The VM's are each in a separate folder - previous I just had to select those folder in the exclusion list. Just trying to be clear.

You can see in the attached screen shot that the expected full backup size is "only" 145.37 GB now, but prior to the exclusion it was about 500+ GB.

I don't think this is anything to do with Fusion per se - something that changed in Catalina as described in a previous post.