does icloud remove files from mac hard drive

#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE FULL#
#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE PC#
#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE DOWNLOAD#

Maybe the sheer number of files involved. I don’t know what was different in this case. All I can say is that I became aware of this issue when it happened to a friend, and Apple Support was not able to recover her documents.

*Update: Dan Moren mentions that the “Recover Documents” screen on can be used to recover deleted files, so “forever” might not be forever. People’s data is sacred, and Apple makes it really easy to just vaporize it, forever. And even if they did, that is not a sufficient warning that an unknown selection of unloaded files will be deleted if that folder is moved.Ĭloud storage is a brilliant idea, but the way Apple has implemented it is reckless and irresponsible. There is no indicator that a folder contains non-synced files. There are indicators in individual files, but not on folders that contain non-synced files. Unlike Dropbox, and many of its competitors, Apple does not keep old copies of files.īut surely there was some “loading indicator” or something to indicate that this data wasn’t ready for manipulation, right? Nope. Forever*.īut you can just go into the web UI and roll back a folder to an earlier version, right? Nope.

#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE DOWNLOAD#

icloud files and use them to download the originals from iCloud’s servers, right? It’s gone from iCloud Drive, and it exists nowhere on your hard drive.īut OS X will just see those. This file, only a couple kilobytes in size, is the placeholder that OS X uses to pretend that the file existed on your system. But once they download, they’ll be in their new location. That’s what dragging a file from one place to another generally does!īut what happens if there are files inside this folder that haven’t yet synced to your local machine? Well, the move operation will be slower, because your Mac has to first download them from iCloud Drive. Apple kindly warns you that your dragging action is moving that folder, and that the files will be moved to your Mac, and won’t exist on iCloud Drive anymore. Well, you can just drag their folders do the other destination, right? You sure can. And let’s say that, on your shiny new Mac, you want to move these files from iCloud Drive to your local hard drive, or to another synced drive like Google Drive or Dropbox. Large Keynote presentations, Photoshop files, and personal photos.

#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE FULL#

So, let’s say you have a folder full of these placeholders. These files masquerade as the real thing, but they are just placeholders. So what look like local copies of your iCloud Drive files are actually just dummy files. But of course, your new Mac can’t download these files instantly. If all your documents are stored in iCloud, this is easy! Just sign in to iCloud on your new Mac, and boom, there are all your files. Let’s take a common scenario: getting a new Mac. That would be heartbreaking.īut that is exactly what Apple’s iCloud Drive does. After all, if you’re trusting Apple with all your precious photos and personal documents and work files, you’d better hope Apple won’t just lose them on you. That’s pretty cool! All your files on all your devices.

#DOES ICLOUD REMOVE FILES FROM MAC HARD DRIVE PC#

Then access them from your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, or PC With iCloud Drive, you can safely store all your presentations, spreadsheets, PDFs, images, and any other kind of document in iCloud.

Does icloud remove files from mac hard drive