BigSur USB installer for SSD upgrade giving errors 'Sudo... not found'

[audihismind]

My MBP retina mid 2014 has been a daily joy to use with the ssd, but now I need to upgrade the drive for a tool build and I have no room for the dockers. So the plan is to upgrade the 250Gb ssd to a 1Tb ssd, using these directions How to create a bootable installer for macOS and Download macOS Big Sur DMG File 11.3.1 - Latest Version' I made space by moving it to icloud.

I looked for similar threads but only found somewhat related but not my issue "BigSur Time Machine" and "Cannot find my external SSD startup disk", I did just find this (hope a diff mac forum link is ok) "How can I download a dmg of Big Sur in Monterey OS?" but its dealing more with BigSur inside Monterey. The user bogdanw post on April 8th of 2022 is where I am now... other than that I'm lost in how to solve this.

So i tried that UUByte DMG Editor but that didn't work for this or another file.

Step four throws 'sudo' errors in the terminal after I copy the sudo and path into the terminal in step 4.

My Unix/Linux is ok but I'm not sure what this says now, or how to handle/solve so I can just setup a USB-installer. But this in effect says

========
I want to use super user to install Big Sur.app from from applications folder using `createinstallmedia` command on the `MAC_BigSur` `volume`
========

Questions:

1. This is weird because I don't have 'Big Sur.app', I have "BigSur13-3-1.dmg" and was told to put it in Applications folder in step 3. So is `createinstallmedia` going to generate the .app from my .dmg?
2. Are these pieces of documentation wrong, outdated or is there a reason I can't 'sudo'. I am the administrator and did what this page advised 'createinstallmedia: command not found - Apple Community' that links back to link number one, the string was copied I only changed the volume name.
3. What is a good "Learning Linux/Unix" course you would recommend, this fall I'm going to sit for the AWS cloud practicer, then for my Linux LFCA Certification

Attached:
To keep track of the versions steps and feedback I created a Mac_Big_Sur_Installer.md file I'm attaching and would like to open source. I had to change it to .txt or it wouldn't allow the upload.

```
wyattdrive:/Volumes $ ls

HELK_Testbed
MAC_BigSur Wyatt HD
SFGrapher com.apple.TimeMachine.localsnapshots

wyattdrive:/Volumes $ cd ..

wyattdrive:/ $ sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Big\ Sur.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MAC_BigSur

Password: <entered>

sudo: /Applications/Install macOS Big Sur.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia: command not found

wyattdrive:/ $ sudo /Applications/Install\ BigSur13-3-1.dmg/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MAC_BigSur

sudo: /Applications/Install BigSur13-3-1.dmg/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia: command not found
```

Steps Taken

1. Purchased a 1tb SSD and little adapter to fit in the mac
2. Cloned my existing machine onto the usb c external sabrent drive
3. Downloaded the BigSur 13-3-1.dmg
4. Went to my terminal to enter "sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Big\ Sur.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia --volume /Volumes/MAC_BigSur"
   1. Which throws an error 'command not found' that's weird... also my git and bash have been giving weird errors in files which I thought was a PATH issue from python projects. Now I'm not sure
5. When prompted, type your administrator password and press Return again. Terminal doesn't show any characters as you type your password.
6. When prompted, type Y to confirm that you want to erase the volume, then press Return.
7. Terminal shows the progress as the volume is erased.
8. After the volume is erased, you may see an alert that Terminal would like to access files on a removable volume.
9. Click OK to allow the copy to proceed.
10. When Terminal says that it's done, the volume will have the same name as the installer you downloaded, such as Install macOS BigSur.
11. You can now quit Terminal and eject the volume.
12. Turn off the computer, swap the drives.
13. Restart and press command R, select the ssd

 

[Rod]

You may be getting a bit bogged down in the details there.
If I understand correctly you want to transfer the contents of a 250GB internal SSD to a 1TB SSD that will be installed into your 2014 MBP?
If that is the case there is no need to download Big Sur, create a bootable installer, not to mention using Terminal for that process, the most difficult manner I can think of. There are several 3rd party apps like Install Disk Creator that will create a bootable USB installer on a thumb drive in one step.
Instead I suggest you use the free, no obligation, 30 day, fully functional trial of Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) to create a bootable clone of your 250GB drive on to a suitable size EHD. See; Creating legacy bootable copies of macOS (Big Sur and later) | Carbon Copy Cloner | Bombich Software
Install your new SSD.
Boot your MBP from the clone.
Use the CCC app to clone the contents of your 250GB SSD onto the 1TB SSD (simply by swapping the source and target).
This will include the operating system as well as your settings, preferences and user data.

 

[audihismind]

You may be getting a bit bogged down in the details there.
If I understand correctly you want to transfer the contents of a 250GB internal SSD to a 1TB SSD that will be installed into your 2014 MBP?
If that is the case there is no need to download Big Sur, create a bootable installer, not to mention using Terminal for that process, the most difficult manner I can think of. There are several 3rd party apps like Install Disk Creator that will create a bootable USB installer on a thumb drive in one step.
Instead I suggest you use the free, no obligation, 30 day, fully functional trial of Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) to create a bootable clone of your 250GB drive on to a suitable size EHD. See; Creating legacy bootable copies of macOS (Big Sur and later) | Carbon Copy Cloner | Bombich Software
Install your new SSD.
Boot your MBP from the clone.
Use the CCC app to clone the contents of your 250GB SSD onto the 1TB SSD (simply by swapping the source and target).
This will include the operating system as well as your settings, preferences and user data.

That was so helpful thank you, thank you, thank you... cloning now.