MP 1,1-5,1 Help with migrating mac data/apps for Fresh Install of osx

[krishnaM]

I am planning to upgrade my osx to Mojave and want to do a fresh install of osx and manually transfer the data and apps instead of using the Migration Assistant (as recommended by many members here) to clear the junk/clutter/malware files that might have accumulated over the last 10 years. However I have always used Migration Assistant in the past and do not want to mess up while migrating. Unfortunately I couldn't find much information except this one article:
https://www.intego.com/mac-security...hould-you-migrate-or-do-a-clean-installation/
I am not very clear about transferring the Library Folder as described. I'll appreciate if you can give me links to any other articles or step by step instructions.

Also, I backup my iphone to mac using itunes. Can I transfer the iphone backup folder to new mac drive and be able to sync the iphone without getting the data wiped?

 

[Rodan52]

I would suggest you either clone your existing HD using either Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper (I prefer CCC). You can get a free 30 day fully functional trial from Bombich. https://bombich.com/
Download the Mojave installer but quit it when it launches. It will remain in your Apps Folder.
Now download from https://macdaddy.io/ Install Disk Creator, its free too.
You will need a USB External HD for your clone a bit larger than your internal HD. Its a good investment and you might decide to keep CCC once you have tried it. I prefer it to Time Machine.
You will also need a blank USB thumb drive 12Gb minimum.
Use Install Disk Creator to create a bootable installer of Mojave onto the thumb drive. It does the whole thing once you select the Mojave installer in its pref window.
So now you have a CCC clone of your HD and a bootable installer for Mojave.
Check that CCC is bootable. Go to Start Up preferences in System prefs a check that CCC backup appears as an option. If so all is well, eject and disconnect the External CCC USB HD.
Plug in the thumb drive.
Now you can shut down then boot up again holding the option key down. You will see the Instal Disk Creator as an option, choose that.
You will now have a window with Disk Utility available, use disk utility to erase the Macintosh HD.
When complete choose Instal MacOS. This will instal a mint version of Mojave with just the native apps an OS.
fter you have started up in your new version of macOS Mojave you can connect the CCC clone and begin importing the things you want by simply dragging and dropping them into the appropriate folders.
Eg, select all the contents of the Documents folder in the clone and drag them into the Documents folder on Mojave.

 

[krishnaM]

I have already completed installation of Mojave on a new SSD and I need to transfer the data and apps. I am going to download all the apps and copy the data files from my Home folder. I am not clear about the transferring the 'Library folder' and 'iPhone backup folder'

 

[flaubert]

Strictly speaking, if you're going to do a truly clean install you don't transfer the library folder. The library folder is where all your software applications store their product keys and settings and helper files and all that; if you 1) sign into your Apple ID and 2) install your apps from scratch, by downloading them from the app store or their respective web sites, and then enter your purchase credentials again you won't need to transfer anything from the old Library folder at all. There are some exceptions for apps that don't store data in the cloud, or special data that you've saved from an app (in my case, I pull data out of my imap mail account on a regular basis to store in local folders from within Thunderbird, and so those folders have to be transferred manually from ~/Library/Thunderbird/Profiles when I do a clean install). Another potential class of apps that may be storing data locally is browsers: if you're not taking advantage of Firefox / Chrome / Safari's cloud syncing capability then you'll have to transfer the profile folder over to the new install (in the case of Firefox you'll find it in ~/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles). But if you've enabled cloud syncing on your browsers all you have to do is sign in once you fire up the browser in your newly installed environment. Keychains are one thing that you'll sometimes want to copy over manually if you're not using iCloud Keychain (~/Library/Keychains, I always rename the old keychain to reflect the system it came from, i.e. "High_Sierra_login.keychain").

A lot of the other data in Library is stuff that Apple sets up and controls, and it is better to just sign into your Apple ID on the new install and let Apple populate all the rest of it - manually transferring it over is just asking for trouble, in my experience. Way back in 10.4 you could image your home directory and move it around to different machines, but it's been problematic since at least Snow Leopard (10.6) to copy the Library folder contents. The intego article mentions different classes of data in library, but most of them won't apply to a general user. To wit:

Calendars: should be synced via iCloud for most people (when you sign into iCloud it will get re-populated)
Fonts: most folks don't install custom font packs
iTunes: most people don't install plug-ins, custom scripts; you don't need to worry about stored iOS updates in almost every case because you should be running the latest iOS (which you can download again in the new environment)
Keychains: if you have iCloud Keychain turned on in your old environment and your new install you won't need to worry about transferring this
Mail: with the caveat mentioned earlier about local folders, generally speaking your mail resides on the imap server of iCloud / Gmail / Fastmail or similar and will populate automatically once you log into your mail with Apple Mail or Thunderbird.
Preference panes: very rare that anyone installs pref panes these days.
Safari: as mentioned above, if you use cloud syncing you don't have to transfer bookmarks.

I wouldn't transfer iPhone backups - just make a new one in your new install environment. A backup is only useful until such time as you make a newer one, so just make a new one when you're running in your clean install.

Here's a tip: what I do on clean installs is copy my entire old Library over to the new machine or new environment as OldLibrary, and then keep it on hand next to Library for a few weeks until I'm sure that I've got everything I need. To accomplish this you can first duplicate it on the old environment and rename the duplicate OldLibrary before copying it over to the new install environment.

Strictly speaking, this question should be asked in the Mojave section of the forum, not the hardware section for Mac Pro's, by the way. Although it is true that a lot of the really high-functioning Mac users happen to be Mac Pro owners 🙂. Good luck!

 

[Rodan52]

I have already completed installation of Mojave on a new SSD and I need to transfer the data and apps. I am going to download all the apps and copy the data files from my Home folder. I am not clear about the transferring the 'Library folder' and 'iPhone backup folder'

Ah, well you are already well advanced. As Flaubert said, you don't want to import the Library folder that will contain a lot of the stuff you were trying to get rid of and will populate itself.
Downloading and installing fresh copies of your apps is a good idea, some will require installers of their own anyway and permissions granted in System Prefs.
Performing a new backup and sync of your iPhone will/should be all you need to do in that area.
It is just the personal data that you need to transfer; documents, photos, music, desktop files (if you have any) and downloads if needed.
If you already have a mint version of macOS Mojave a USB flash drive should suffice for transfer.

 

[krishnaM]

Thanks for the detailed replies.

I wouldn't transfer iPhone backups - just make a new one in your new install environment. A backup is only useful until such time as you make a newer one, so just make a new one when you're running in your clean install.

I thought iphone data gets wiped out when syncing with new mac as Apple wants synced to only one computer. I'll buy some iCloud space to backup temporarily and try syncing with new mac drive. I can always get the music files but it is the iPhone settings I want to preserve.

I know I should have posted in Mojave form but being owner of cMP for > ten years I feel this forum more like 'at home' and always received very helpful response. Thanks again.

 

[flaubert]

Your phone should retain its settings when you plug it into a computer that has a new environment. You'll have to go through some actions to get them to trust each other (enter code show on phone, etc), but it won't send data/settings from your Mac to your phone unless you explicitly tell it to do a restore.
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That being said, it's never a bad idea to have multiple backups, so turning on iCloud Backup is fine.
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I should have offered one very important caveat: syncing won’t alter the data on your phone provided that you’ve already copied over your Music folder to the new environment. What I’m trying to convey is that the backup data is (so far as I know) one-way: from your phone to the Mac. The sync parameters are stored in the iTunes database under the Music folder, not in Library.

 

[Rodan52]

You can certainly turn on iCloud backup on your iPhone, it's a good idea anyway, I have. If you want to be completely sure of preserving the maximum data you will need to do an encrypted backup to iCloud on your device. You can also make an encrypted backup using iMazing. In either case you will need a recovery key and password. Unencrypted backups will not include settings or health info.