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Total Comments |
Recent Comment |
| Turntable Listening Experiment and Wrap-Up |
A few weeks ago, [The Tracking Angle][tracking] posted a YouTube video comparing two turntables, using the same arm, cartridge and phono preamp. The two unit sounded surprisingly different to my ear, given the only change was the actual device holding and spinning the LP (assuming, of course, that when the… |
Dave Nanian |
11/21/23 |
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| Snow Ventura |
As surely as spring follows winter, and summer follows spring, macOS release season follows summer. And with that, nearly always, a new version of SuperDuper! I'm happy to announce the immediate availability of SuperDuper! v3.8, which bring Sonoma compatibility, along with some other minor changes. You can read about the… |
Dave Nanian |
09/26/23 |
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| Prompting Problems |
tl;dr - SuperDuper! v3.8 B2 now available. Includes some fixes for pre-Sonoma users, and a UI enhancement. Download SuperDuper! v3.8 B2 Guidance vs. Annoyance Designing UIs involves a certain amount of compromise. You want to give the user the freedom to do what they want...but you also want to guide… |
Dave Nanian |
09/18/23 |
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| Sonoma! |
TL;DR v3.8 B1 is out, with support for macOS Sonoma! You can download it from here: Download SuperDuper! v3.8 B1 It's Beta Season! Hey, folks! We're back and we're happy to be bringing full Sonoma support to SuperDuper. In general, v3.7.5 works well with Sonoma already, and this release is… |
Dave Nanian |
09/11/23 |
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| You Got Culpa on My Mea! |
One of the problems with supporting versions of macOS going back to 10.10 is that it becomes harder and harder to test older versions...and that's complicated further by Apple silicon, since you can't run an Intel VM on Apple silicon...Rosetta won't work. Unfortunately, in v3.7.3 and v3.7.4, this has caused… |
Dave Nanian |
01/21/23 |
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| Wait, Hold On! |
You know that thing where you put out a release, that fixes two minor crashes, but then a typo causes a different failure? Well, welcome to SuperDuper! v3.7.3/v3.7.4, the "Can I Have a Do-Over" release. v3.7.3 was released to correct two rare problems: both of which had to do with… |
Dave Nanian |
01/12/23 |
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| Analyzed, Statically |
Well, v3.7.1 didn't last very long, did it. >sigh< Happy to announce SuperDuper! v3.7.2, the "give me a fix, one fix only" release. Ready for Launch Here's the deal: when Applescript starts SuperDuper with a specific Apple Event ("launch"), SuperDuper starts and doesn't load the default settings. Instead, it waits… |
Dave Nanian |
12/17/22 |
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| Ventura Highway |
I'm happy to announce the immediate availability of SuperDuper! v3.7.1, an update that will go down in history as being released today. >fanfare< So, what's different? As is tradition around these parts, after the release of a major OS, and our corresponding major update to support it, there's always something… |
Dave Nanian |
12/16/22 |
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| Silly Season |
Welcome back to Silly Season, where we all wait to see what the Apple gods have wrought with the new release of the OS that'll come this month. As most of you already know, since Big Sur, programs that want to copy the OS must rely upon Apple's replicator ('asr')… |
Dave Nanian |
10/17/22 |
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| The “Roll Up Some Fixes” Release! |
Things have been relatively quiet here at the blog, but not because I've just been enjoying listening to records. Rather, we've been working on a series of fixes that we're releasing today as SuperDuper v3.6. This release is especially important for Apple silicon users. macOS 12.3 will break SuperDuper! v3.5… |
Dave Nanian |
03/13/22 |
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| Plastic Fantastic |
I'm sure it's clear from everything I write, but I am, as they say, an Old. Part of that involves going through many technological transitions: computers; cars; TV; cable, satellite; cell phones; BBS systems; internet; touch-tone phones... I mean, it goes on and on. Many of those are major advances;… |
Dave Nanian |
11/07/21 |
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| It’s a Trip to the Moon, Not a Marathon |
tl;dr At long last, v3.5 is out, with Big Sur and Monterey Bootable Backups Support for macOS 10.10 and later Apple silicon support Various fixes and improvements (see the Revision History in the Help menu) Under Big Sur and later, the OS is only copied if you use Erase, then… |
Dave Nanian |
10/25/21 |
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| Tweaking |
tl;dr - new beta release (B5) now available. Very minor changes, including additional prompts for old licenses on Apple silicon. Download away. Download SuperDuper! v3.5 B5 Signposting So, B4's rollout went well, with only a few people accusing us of trying to "put one over" on people by invalidating licenses.… |
Dave Nanian |
10/24/21 |
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| Native Apple Silicon, Big Sur & Monterey |
Executive Summary v3.5 B4 is now out, is fully Apple silicon native, and produces bootable backups for both Big Sur and Monterey. It will be offered as an automatic update for existing v3.5 Beta users, or you can download it here. Download SuperDuper! v3.5 B4 Windier Version with Details So… |
Dave Nanian |
10/17/21 |
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| Really Riding a Bike |
On Saturday, I'll be heading up to New Boston, NH to participate in the first group ride I've done in, well, years. I'm both looking forward to it and dreading it, because like a lot of others I'm pandemic portly, out of shape, and out of practice. But the only… |
Dave Nanian |
05/21/21 |
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| Like Riding a Bike |
You know it's been a while since you last released a Beta when you don't quite remember the rhythms of the process. But, it doesn't take long for muscle memory to kick in... and I'm happy to say that it's going really well. A lot of that is due to… |
Dave Nanian |
05/05/21 |
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| Finally. |
Sound the trumpets! We're happy (and, frankly, relieved) to announce the immediate availability of SuperDuper v3.5 Beta 1: our first version to fully support Big Sur backups. That's right: bootable Big Sur backups for Intel and M1. Today! Shut Up and Give Me My Download For those who aren't interested… |
Dave Nanian |
04/29/21 |
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| That’s Big SIR to You! |
Hey, folks. Sorry it's been a while, but it's been a busy time. Let's start with the bad news first. Bad news As you know, SuperDuper 3.3.1 cannot copy a volume with Big Sur on it. We're currently blocked on some issues I don't have direct control over, and as… |
Dave Nanian |
01/31/21 |
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| Big Sur |
I'm going to keep this short and to the point. It's never a good idea to update to a just-released major OS version unless you have to. Nobody knows how reliable Big Sur is going to be for regular users. Let someone else find out before you take the jump.… |
Dave Nanian |
11/11/20 |
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| Under Construction |
I haven't said anything about Big Sur yet, and since the public beta has been out for a while, and I'm getting more questions about it, it's time. At present, it's not possible to make bootable copies of Big Sur, even with asr, Apple's own built-in replication utility. As such,… |
Dave Nanian |
09/04/20 |
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| I Like Batteries! |
I've probably mentioned on the blog before that I'm a big fan of electric cars. Starting in 2013 with a first generation Tesla Model S P85, both Z and I have been powered by electrons, with two leased BMW i3s and we've now replaced the Tesla with a Porsche Taycan.… |
Dave Nanian |
08/07/20 |
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| Never Look a Gift Fix in the Mouth |
Happy to say that Apple has fixed the bug in 10.15.5 that caused firmlinks to not be connected after being copied by backup programs. As you may know, this had two symptoms: The backup looked incomplete, with some folders seemingly empty on the backup drive. Note that the backup was… |
Dave Nanian |
07/16/20 |
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| Black Boxes and Bugs |
During last year's Catalina introduction, Apple's APFS session introduced a new capability: the asr (Apple Software Restore) tool was now able to perform both APFS copies and, used appropriately, "delta" backups. We were pretty excited about this new feature, until we actually tried to use it. The new feature basically… |
Dave Nanian |
05/28/20 |
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| Anniversaries |
One year after my Dad's death, I was flying back home, out of the first COVID-19 hot zone in the Northwestern US, listening to people cough, feeling the tension in the air. It was the same flight I caught rushing home, after cutting our vacation short, after he said not… |
Dave Nanian |
04/05/20 |
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| Modern Times |
Over the years, Shirt Pocket has been hosted on a number of local Unix-based systems. As I recall, it started out on a Cobalt Qube, then moved to a Power PC Mac mini, then the original "tall" Intel Mac mini, and finally to a "short" Intel mini. These systems served… |
Dave Nanian |
02/07/20 |
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| Happy Thanksgiving Update! |
Happy Thanksgiving, for those who celebrate. Whenever there's a new, major release, there's an inevitable set of problems that weren't caught during testing (even the long public beta). We've got those mostly taken care of in the new 3.3.1 update, released today. Most users having problems are running macOS 10.10… |
Dave Nanian |
11/28/19 |
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| Breaking the Tape |
I'm happy to announce the release of v3.3 of SuperDuper, our fully Catalina-compatible version: happier, perhaps, then even you are in reading the news. It's available via the normal update mechanism, or by downloading it from the web site. Everyone with a Beta version installed will get an update notice… |
Dave Nanian |
11/26/19 |
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| Continued Cranking |
Not much to say about this build: we've fixed a bunch of things, basically. The vast majority of users had success with the last beta. But: Some had schedules that would fail right at the start, with a collapsed window. Fixed! Copies to HFS+ volumes would fail to copy recovery… |
Dave Nanian |
11/15/19 |
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| Hoops, Jumped Through |
I don't talk about it much on the blog, but I get an enormous amount of support email. The quantity can be overwhelming at times, and without some automation, it would be nearly impossible for me to do it alone. Which I do. Every support reply, in all the years… |
Dave Nanian |
11/12/19 |
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| Rolling, Rolling, Rolling… |
Beta updates are rolling along. We've incorporated a number of fixes for additional edge cases, polished some behavior, worked around some OS issues...the usual. We've had a number of people ask whether it's "safe" to run these betas. Now, barring the occasional, rapidly-fixed "goof" (eg the bless error we fixed… |
Dave Nanian |
11/06/19 |
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| Nothing Up My Sleeves Redux |
Yeah, well, sometimes a change to the install process that shouldn't have any effect on anything else...does. Beta 3 gave an error when using bless to bless the drive. The underlying issue was code we have that needs to ignore certain types of output on stderr that aren't actually errors.… |
Dave Nanian |
10/27/19 |
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| Third Time’s a Charm |
Third time isn't a charm; you'll note a bless error at the end of copies. We'll have a new beta Sunday that fixes this dumb goof. (For the impatient - scroll down and you can download Beta 3 at the bottom of this post. Note that existing betas will, as… |
Dave Nanian |
10/26/19 |
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| Beta 2: Floating Owners Strike Back |
As always, a download for the new beta is at the bottom of this post, and if you're uninterested in the changes, you should just scroll down a bit (or, if you have a previous Beta installed, launch SuperDuper and it will offer the update). Beta 1 - Worked Well!… |
Dave Nanian |
10/21/19 |
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| SuperDuper! for Catalina |
As promised, at the bottom of this post is a link to our Catalina beta. A very dramatic announcement! (Also, see https://t.co/2mDlY6LUfu for details.) pic.twitter.com/AUFtTuesUh— Dave Nanian (@dnanian) October 18, 2019 This post is mostly a just-the-facts-ma'am discussion of changes in Catalina that have affected us and may affect you.… |
Dave Nanian |
10/18/19 |
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| Quickly Getting to the Point |
Hey folks. Sorry for the relative silence here. We've been working during the summer on a Catalina update, and unfortunately we're just not quite ready for a general update. But we're close! Catalina introduces some significant changes to the way a startup drive works, and while we've solved the various… |
Dave Nanian |
10/07/19 |
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| Unrelated Stuff I Like |
As we plug along with our Catalina changes, I thought I might write a quick post talking about some other stuff I'm enjoying right now. Because, hey, why not. Coffee Related Software Development and Coffee go together like Chocolate and My Mouth. And so, a lot of it is consumed… |
Dave Nanian |
08/09/19 |
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| Pictures at a Kernel Exhibition |
> Executive Summary: Internally, SuperDuper! can now make bootable copies of "live" Catalina volumes in all three released Beta versions of macOS 10.15. While much work still needs to be done to make things ready for external use, no obstacles are blocking us from pursuing at least one "definitely works"… |
Dave Nanian |
07/09/19 |
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| Up and down the coast |
Another June has come (and gone), and with it the promise of a new, improved version of macOS. In this case, macOS 10.15: Catalina. Sounds so refreshing, doesn't it? Cool breezes, beautiful sunsets, pristine beaches along an endless coast. But no matter what the imagery looks like, it's a time… |
Dave Nanian |
07/02/19 |
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| SuperDuper v3.2.5 Now Available! |
You'd think, given I've written everything here, I'd learn to pay attention to what I've said in the past. Let me explain. In v3.2.4, we started getting occasional reports of scheduled copies running more than once. Which seemed kind of crazy, because, well, our little time-based backup agent—sdbackupbytime—only runs once… |
Dave Nanian |
06/25/19 |
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| RIP Kenneth Nanian - 1928-2019 |
On March 7, 2019, I unfortunately lost my Dad (which is why support has been a bit slow recently). I thought I'd post my eulogy for him here, as delivered, should anyone care. He was a good man, and will be missed. Good morning, everyone. I’m David Nanian, up here… |
Dave Nanian |
03/13/19 |
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| A Full and Complete Accounting of the Benefits of the TouchBar |
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Dave Nanian |
01/19/19 |
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| …But Sometimes You Need UI |
As much as I want to keep SuperDuper!'s UI as spare as possible, there are times when there's no way around adding things. For years, I've been trying to come up with a clever, transparent way of dealing with missing drives. There's obvious tension between the reasons this can happen:… |
Dave Nanian |
11/12/18 |
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| The Best UI is No UI |
In v3.2.2 of SuperDuper!, I introduced the new Auto Wake feature. It's whole reason for being is to wake the computer when the time comes for a backup to run. Simple enough. No UI beyond the regular scheduling interface. The whole thing is managed for you. But What About...? I… |
Dave Nanian |
10/27/18 |
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| Waking the Neighbors |
I'm not going to say Disk Full errors never happen any more. But I am going to say that in the weeks since we released SuperDuper! 3.2, there's been a gigantic drop in their frequency. It's really awesome, both for users (who have fewer failed copies) and for me (since… |
Dave Nanian |
10/09/18 |
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| Smarty Pants |
Executive Summary SuperDuper 3.2 is now available. It includes Mojave support Native Notification Center support (in addition to the existing Growl support) [Better scheduling][scheduling] [A Finder extension to quickly run copies][finder extension] For the technical: [command-line support][command line] Various bug fixes and improvements And surprise! (I love surprises) -- Smart… |
Dave Nanian |
09/24/18 |
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| 3.2 B3: The Revenge! |
(OK, yeah, I should have used "The Revenge" for B4. Stop being such a stickler.) Announcing SuperDuper 3.2 B3: a cavalcade of unnoticeable changes! The march towards Mojave continues, and with the SAE (September Apple Event) happening today, I figured we'd release a beta with a bunch of polish that… |
Dave Nanian |
09/12/18 |
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| Backup on Connect, launchd and ThrottleInterval |
Warning: this is a technical post, put here in the hopes that it'll help someone else someday. We've had a problem over the years that our Backup on Connect LaunchAgent produces a ton of logging after a drive is attached and a copy is running. The logging looks something like:… |
Dave Nanian |
09/09/18 |
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| Technical Update! |
SuperDuper! 3.2 B1 was well received. We literally had no bugs reported against it, which was pretty gratifying. So, let's repeat that with SuperDuper! 3.2 B2! (There's a download link at the bottom of this post.) Remember - SuperDuper! 3.2 runs with macOS 10.10 and later, and has improvements for… |
Dave Nanian |
09/06/18 |
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| macOS Mojave: Opening New Vistas in Security for Mac Users |
Executive summary: sure, it's the Friday before Labor Day weekend, but there's a beta of SuperDuper for Mojave at the bottom of this (interesting?) post! It Gets Worse Back when OS X Lion (10.7) was released, the big marketing push was that iOS features were coming "Back to the Mac",… |
Dave Nanian |
08/31/18 |
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| iFixit Drive Replacement with SuperDuper! |
iFixIt recently released a video showing how to upgrade to an SSD using SuperDuper. Thanks, iFixIt! |
Dave Nanian |
08/19/18 |
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