Exclude iTunes from TM Backup

[AppleDApp]

My iTunes library is located on an external drive. My mac always seems to want to back it up. I already separately backup my media. How can I get my mac to avoid backing up my media twice?

At least I believe thats what's happening because I have a 1tb internal drive which I use about 500gb, and I have about 600gb of media and the total time machine backup size is 1.1tb I want to do this because my time machine drive is only 1tb in capacity.

Thanks

[switon]

Hi,

You can add files, directories, and volumes to a list of exclusions, to be excluded from TM backups. Do this in the Time Machine Preferences panel or using the tmutil commands:

tmutil addexclusion [-p] <file,directory,volume>

The beauty of this is that without the -p option, this is a "sticky" exclusion, meaning that if you move the file to a different location it will still be excuded from the TM backups. So, say you exclude your iTunes Library, then later move it to a different location --- it will still be excluded from your TM backups.

Switon

[AppleDApp]

I can't seem to exclude anything from this window.

[ljonesj]

the plus sign is what allows you to exclude what you want to back up

[AppleDApp]

Originally Posted by ljonesj

the plus sign is what allows you to exclude what you want to back up

Thank you so much I excluded my media folder and deleted all of my backups to start fresh I'll report back once I finish the backup.

[AppleDApp]

I started my backup at the time of my previous post. The backup size was a reasonable 80gb or so. Since then the backup size has gone up to 115gb and the backup is yet to be done. I am not producing content as of this time.