Drag and drop - Will it move or copy my Time Machine backup?

[bollweevil]

I want to copy my Time Machine Backups drive. I want to have two copies when I finish, not just one copy on a different hard disk.

Following the instructions here, which are echoed other places, I have dragged-and-dropped the directory Backups.backupdb from "Disk 1" to "Disk 2". The dialog box with a progress bar is titled "Copy", but I am afraid it might erase the version on "Disk 1", because drag-and-drop usually signifies move and not copy.

Will it copy? Or will it move? I hope it will copy, or else I will have wasted a lot of time.

Thanks.

 

[mulo]

move on same disk, copy on two disks.

 

[bollweevil]

move on same disk, copy on two disks.

That seems reasonable. If it is an intradisk move, then the OS can just relink it instantaneously. If it is an interdisk move, then copying is just as slow as moving.

However, are you sure? How sure are you? I can't find this documented anywhere, and all my disks are busy so I can't do experiments with smaller files/directories.

Thanks.