Thanks for the detailed explanation.

Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:
Currently, "excluded items" in QRecall are on a per-action basis. So if you have multiple actions that capture that same set of files, the items to exclude should be equivalent.

That was exactly the reason why I hoped that I could get a "one list for all" via Time Machine options
I guess I have to wait for the next QRecall Update ...

Johannes

I did some backup maintenance and deleted some items from different archives.

Several times after that it happened that some layers became "incomplete". What does this mean? Waht msut I do now? Verify run okay.

The archive size remained the same (I delete about 50 GB). The status window tells me that 52 GB are unused. But the Inspector window says free = undetermined. Shouldn't give it the same number?

Is it normal that a simple delete of an item is not enough to recover space but I have to compact too?
When does QRecall calculate the unused/free space in archive? It seems that I need a verify to get the number.

Johannes

Simple test: Exclude an item in Time Machine, perform a capture, and see if that item is in the archive.

It is. So the API seems to ignore the user defined exclusions. That means: I have to define (and maintain) several exclusion lists

Johannes

Does QRecall exclude only the items pre-defined by Apple or are all those items that I added manually in the Time Machine preferences option excluded as well?

Johannes

Thanks for your quick response (your support is another reason why I use QRecall).

Magically one of the overdue verify actions jumped into action this morning. Maybe it noticed that I called home
I'll keep an eye on it ...

So once you've captured something with the new version, you can no longer use the old version to access your archives.

Can both versions be used at the same time (not on the same archive of course)? That would be crucial for testing. Nobody would risk a longtime archive for a beta test.

Johannes

Hi James,
QRecall has been my backup workhorse for month now and I'm still satisfied. Very flexible and reliable (saved me already a few times from my own mistakes).

I have a few questions.

Maybe I miss something very obvious, but somehow my verify actions don?t do what I want them to do.
For each of my archives I have created a verify action based on an interval that fits the archive's capture frequency. For example, my short time archive that captures certain folders every hour has its verify action set to every 7 days starting from Jun 16th 2012 1:00 (the date I defined it, I guess). Now the status window shows a yellow LED complaining that it had not been verified for 13 weeks. The archive file is available all the time. Why does the scheduled action not run?

What would be the best way to schedule a verify after each capture? (This would be useful for my off-site backups to make sure the are healthy before I bring them out of the house).

Any news when the command-line tool (or any other means to trigger an action by script) might come up? (That's really the only thing I miss at the moment)

Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:

Johannes wrote:Would it be possible to tell a QRecall Action to capture to two Archives?

There are a number of different ways of doing this. In it's simplest form, an action would act on multiple archives.

That would be sufficient for me.

But the only benefit would be to reduce the number of actions you have to maintain. That's not a horrific burden

It depends
If you use item selections or filters a lot, it's error prone to maintain them in two places.

Maybe an other idea would be to go for a non-UI solution: scripting (tell application "QRecall" to run action X using archive A)

Johannes

I hope you don't mind me picking up this thread.

My offsite solution at present looks like this:

I have two external disks: BackupA and BackupB. Each contain a QRecall Archive and I capture the same source to them alternating.
The benefit is, that in case one Archive corrupts, I have an independent second Archive (and no risk to copy the corruption to the other offsite backup). The downside is that it takes (probably) longer to capture twice than to duplicate.

The only hassle with this approach is, that I have to define each Action twice. Would it be possible to tell a QRecall Action to capture to two Archives?

Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:
That information is (still) in the QRecall activity window.

Yes, of course. But there's no activity indication visible in the Menu item when it's occupied by the red/yellow status light. I don't have the activity window visible all time and sometimes I'd like to see without any further action whether QRecall is doing something or paused.

Johannes

I have the same problem as Ralph. I would suggest an additional entry in the Context Menu of the Status Window: "That's okay". This would set the state of that archive as if a verify/capture has been performed. Alternatively a submenu with a few entries like 1 day, 1 week would do a similar job.

Another thought: The main issue with the red/yellow indicator in the Menu item is, that I now longer see the other indicators like running and paused. Maybe those can either overlay or become priority.

As we are on the Status Window Context Menu, I would find a few more items handy:
- Open Archive in QRecall
- Capture now
- Verify now

Johannes (looking forward to 1.3 beta and the scripting options

me too

This is the one thing that's really missing: simply trigger an action by CLI/Script. My work is too unscheduled and my stuff has too many databases and other special handling needs. So even if QRecall has plenty of schedule options, none of them comes close to a simple trigger script that I could combine with other tasks.

I hope you find time to implement something soon - a primitive form would be more than sufficient for me ...

Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:Third time's the charm.

Charm worked

I could pre-authorize QRecall again from the preferences.
QRecallHelper has been successfully installed in /Library/Application Support/QRecall/#uid/
No complaints in the Log.

Thanks for fixing!
Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:Download and install QRecall 1.2.0(60) alpha and let me know if that fixes things for you.

Unfortunately not.
I did a drag and drop install from the dmg and started QRecall. After that the scheduler fired up the next action. So QRecall is running again. But it installed the helpers in the user's Library folder only. I was not asked to authorize nor could I do it manually from the preferences pane.
When I try the installer, it tries (and fails) to create the folder /Library/Application Support/QRecall.

I noticed a few new entries in the log. Don't know of they are related ...
I've sent a diagnostic report.

Johannes

James Bucanek wrote:Let's do a manual uninstall and try again:

I followed your instructions

- Trash the ~/Library/Application Support/QRecall folder
- Trash any QRecall* items in ~/Library/Services
- Trash any com.qrecall.* items in ~/Library/LaunchAgents
- Trash the /Library/Application Support/QRecall folder
- Trash any com.qrecall.* items in /Library/LaunchAgents and /Library/LaunchDaemons

Non of these items existed!

- Restart.
Launch QRecall. It should ask for authorization to reinstall itself.

Did not ask. Going to preferences and trying to preauthorize manually did not work either.

Afterwards, please send another diagnostic report.

Sent.

Hope you can find anything ...
Johannes