I need specific type of backup software

Oh yah, seeing as this is my first post, might as well say hello to you all...

Hello...

With that said, here's my situation:

I've always had a very large music collection (I'm a freelance music writer and collect about 5 albums a week on average), and with my 300GB LaCie, I was always able to just copy my iTunes folder in full. The only music files I ever had to delete on my powerbook were songs or albums I just plain didn't like. When I'd copy the music folder to the external again, the backups of those unfortunate files would then be deleted as well because the folder would just replace itself. Up to a point, that was fine, I deleted those songs for a reason and they weren't missed. My itunes folder is now approaching 65GBs, and I'm down to the last little slivers of space on my powerbook.

So this is exactly what I need out of the software:

I want to delete albums I don't listen to often, but have backups of them on the LaCie. Most of the backup software I've looked at will just clone the music folder, deleting the songs on my external that I deleted on the main drive (which is the last thing I want) and creating an exact copy. I need a program that will copy all new/modified files from Folder A over to Folder B, but never delete files on B that I deleted on A. Using FileMerge I've been able compare the folders and do this manually with Finder, but its a huge hassle. Something reliable and automatic would be nice, I hope at least one of you knows of something. Thanks in advance for your assistance.

*deleted*

benijuana said:

I realize now I probably should have posted this in the Software forum. I'm learning my way around here. Anyway, I'll post this there as well. If any moderator is reading this and no one has answered my question, feel free to delete this post.

Click to expand...

It has already been moved to the proper forum. No need to repost.:black:

Oh ok, you moved it for me. I was so confused. Anyway, thank you.

well I see no one knows the answer so far...

Does anyone at least have any basic pointers for Applescript so I could make it myself? A general outline would be much appreciated, I've barely used the program so far but I could probably fill it in from there.

Here are two scripts that act in concert to your music files. You'll need three folders: Tin Pan Alley, Folder A and Folder B. If you change the folder names, don't forget to change them in both scripts.

The first script copies the files from a central-repository folder that I named Tin Pan Alley, to Folder A, then moves the files from Tin Pan Alley to Folder B. This central repository ensures that the files in Folder A are identical to those in Folder B, especially if you had changed the songs' names or edited the files some other way before dropping them into Tin Pan Alley.

Over some period of time you decide which files you want to discard, and remove these from Folder A.

You then click the second script that duplicates Folder A's remaining files to Folder B, replacing the duplicates in Folder B. Since the files in Folder A are duplicates of their counterparts in Folder B, nothing in Folder B is lost, and the files that you deleted in Folder A remain untouched in Folder B.

The second script, Music Two, could empty Folder A, rather than leave files in it, if you change the command to "move" from "duplicate."

I added labels to the files so you could check the files' movements, since the files are identical in every other way. If everything checks out, you can delete the label command lines in the script Music One. For what it's worth, I saved the scripts as applications.

Script One:

tell application "Finder"
duplicate every item of folder "Tin Pan Alley" of desktop to folder "Folder A" of desktop
set label index of every item of folder "Folder A" of desktop to 1
move every item of folder "Tin Pan Alley" of desktop to folder "Folder B" of desktop
set label index of every item of folder "Folder B" of desktop to 2
end tell

Script Two:

tell application "Finder"
duplicate every item of folder "Folder A" of desktop to folder "Folder B" of desktop with replacing
end tell

You'll have to change the pathways, of course. They'd probably look something like:

duplicate every item of folder "Tin Pan Alley" of desktop to folder "Folder A" of folder "benijuana" of folder "Users" of startup disk
move every item of folder "Tin Pan Alley" of desktop to folder "Folder B" of disk "LaCie"