Some other TimeMachine exclusions
In my other post on the topic I excluded my local Mail app files from my TimeMachine backups because they were tripping over McAfee AntiVirus. I thought that it might be sensible to add a few other exclusions to trim down the total amount backed up and reduce the impact of frequent TM backups on my laptop.
Caches
Really, you want to keep them? I thought not. They include the browser caches for Safari and Firefox amongst other things.
- Click the “+” button.
- In the finder window that's displayed, press Cmd + Shift + G.
- Enter ~/Library/Caches in to the path field and click Go.
- Click Exclude.
Downloads
You can download them again, right?
- Click the “+” button.
- In the finder window that's displayed, select your Downloads folder.
- Click Exclude.
Trash
- Click the “+” button.
- In the finder window that's displayed, press Cmd + Shift + G.
- Enter ~/.Trash in to the path field and click Go.
- Click Exclude.
Virtual Machines
This is a choice really. The VMs that I have can easily be rebuilt.
- Click the “+” button.
- In the finder window that's displayed, select Documents / Virtual Machines.
- Click Exclude.
Sleep File
It's a bit like the Windows hibernation file.
- Click the “+” button.
- In the finder window that's displayed, press Cmd + Shift + G.
- Enter /var/vm in to the path field and click Go.
- Click Exclude.
Results
That's better! TM is backing up 40Gb less than before and fewer of the transient files that really aren't needed but change often.