Exactly what is the disk shown in the Finder named Macintosh HD, in Big Sur and later versions of macOS? An exploration of the structure of the modern boot disk.
APFS
Symlinks are popular but prove fragile when folders get renamed or moved. Hard links don’t support directories and can’t cross volumes. The alias works best overall, but isn’t supported in Terminal.
What if you want to boot your Mac using two or more different versions of macOS, with different versions of APFS? Here’s how to avoid problems.
Update adds two new datestamp fields, and gives decimal seconds in times. Use this app to explore how macOS sets those on files, as shown.
What can cause low copy speeds for very large and possibly sparse files, such as VMs? Causes explained, and tools you can use to discover why.
Most backup apps make snapshots, so why not use those instead of conventional backups? Because of the weaknesses of snapshots, as explained.
Originally two separate apps, they were brought together in Mac OS X, and have survived largely unscathed to Sequoia. Here are some highs and lows to remember.
Sparse files are now common among databases, disk images, and virtual machines. How they work in APFS, how they’re created, and how they can explode.
Consider the fidelity of backup copies, the speed of a backup method, and the risk of losing the contents of that backup. And test backups by restoring samples from them.
Classic TM backed up HFS+ to HFS+; current TM backs up APFS to APFS. But what if you want to back up a mixture of APFS and HFS+ volumes?
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