Time Capsule & Truecrypt Volumes

[Taiphun]

Hi all,

I've got a TC question - related to Truecrypt Volumes.

Here's my setup:
- My /Users/username/Documents contain two 20G Truecrypt Volumes. Let's call these downloads.tc and documents.tc.
- When I log in, I have to mount these two volumes, so they're mounted as /Volumes/Documents and /Volumes/Downloads
- All personal files - email, scripts, expenses, documents, spreadsheets, etc. are saved into /Volumes/Documents
- All downloads (Firefox, Transmission, Newsgroups, etc.) are saved into /Volumes/Downloads

The two volumes in Documents (*.tc files) are a static 20G in size, space is pre-allocated to the Truecrypt volumes.

From what I understand, Time Capsule performs an initial full backup, followed by incremental backups. If I want these two TC volumes backed up, is it true that it will do a full backup of the .tc files, and then each incremental will update the .tc files, thus backing up a combined 40G each time an incremental backup is performed?

So if I get a terabyte Time Capsule, it will only keep 25 backups of my data?

Thanks... I know this is kind've a strange way of doing things..

 

[netnothing]

Yup, pretty sure that's how it will work. TM will treat those as changed files and backup the full 40GB each time.

This is similar to Entourage databases for email or virtual machines. It's all stored in one big file, thus it would be backed up every time....wasting a lot of space.

I'm guessing that each time you add documents into the truecrypt volumes, the date changes on the .tc file?

You could always test with a smaller .tc volume.

-Kevin

 

[Skywalker18]

any help with that in the meantime since May ?
cause i have the same worry and don't really know how to deal with it...
thanks

 

[Phil A.]

No update - TC will still back up the entire TrueCrypt volume each time it changes. TC backs up incrementally on a file by file basis (i.e. if a file changes it will back it up) - As TrueCrypt volumes are stored as a single file, they will be backed up in their entirety whenever anything on them is changed

 

[Skywalker18]

Thanks Phil,

what if the volume is mounted ? will that only backup the real changed files instead of all the volume ?

thank you

 

[Phil A.]

Thanks Phil,

what if the volume is mounted ? will that only backup the real changed files instead of all the volume ?

thank you

If you exclude the TrueCrypt file itself and include the volume (it may automatically exclude itself when mounted but you can change then within Time Machine preferences), then the files within it will be backed up individually but the files on the backup won't be encrypted

 

[Skywalker18]

That's a good point... didn't think about that details... data won't be encrypted...
so actually i should be carefull with what data i have on my timecapsule because some of it has been made while the truecrypt file was open therefore some data is not encrypted...
how could i check this ?
will i /should i delete old backedup data and start again making sure truecrypt is not mounted ?

thanks a lot !

 

[Heraklit]

True Crypt and Entourage

Hi Taiphun, how did you manage that Entourage accepts the true crypt volume? Here is my setup.

I have my private data (mostly dokuments) on the true crypt volume with Alias to the document folder so that I can access them from there.
My Entourage folder is for some reason under library/preference/Microsoft User Data/etc. (I think I deleted it once from my documents). However when I copy the entourage identity to the encrypted volume and out an Alias instead it doesn't work.
What did you do, did you encrypt the whole library folder?

Thanks for all replies!