Sync-ing two Macs - advice needed

I can do these things, but I cannot easily describe them to you. Sorry. I am not good at directions like that.

I can say, though, that if you Google for these things, you can easily find step-by-step instructions.

Apple also sells MobileMe ($99 per year, I think $69 if you purchase with your Mac. Not sure of the prices or availability in France, though). This will keep your iCal and address book in sync (also bookmarks). You can read more here: Apple - MobileMe - Your iPhone, iPad, Mac, and PC. In perfect sync.

Lightroom will have to be done more manually -- and you have to back up both the files and the LR database. Do you have an external drive? You can set that up as a time machine for both devices, and you may be able to sync that way (not entirely sure).

Hopefully someone can add more here than I have. Good luck.

 

Mobile me for 2, 3 and 4
I just ordered mobile me from amazon for $50 instead of the $99 from apple it was listed as older version but it doesn't matter as it is just a code. I have been using mobile me for years.

Chronosync For #1 to do it automatically or you can do it manually over a network or through firewire by mounting one computer as an external hard drive
ChronoSync | Perform File and Folder Synchronizations and Backups Like Clockwork | Econ Technologies

 

You can restore directly from Time Machine, btw.

I'm enough of a Unix geek that I do it the old-fashioned way.

1. Slower way with less setup:

In order to do this, you need to enable sharing on the computer you're syncing to (System Preferences -> Sharing -> Remote Login -- be sure to turn it off when you're done)

Let's say my remote machine is at ethernet address 10.0.1.9. Open Terminal (in Applications/Utilities) and type:

rsync -e ssh -avE ~/ deirdre@10.0.1.9:~/

2. Faster way:

Re-boot your newer computer (once you've set it up) as a target disk on your old computer. See: Mac 101: Target Disk Mode: Apple

Open Terminal (Applications/Utilities) and df to find the named volume mount point of the target disk, e.g. /Volumes/MyNewComputer

rsync -avE ~/ /Volumes/MyNewComputer/Users/deirdre

(Obviously, use your username)

 

Look at "Migration Assistant" either in Utilites or Applications. If I remember it transfers your date from one Mac to another and you have the option to choose what info gets transferred. It is a standard part of the OSX software.

 

It's in the Utilities folder within the Application folder. There are things it doesn't transfer (outside the home directory) which is one reason I tend not to use it.

 

DANGER WILL ROBINSON! Migration assistant is made so you can transfer data from old mac to new mac, it's not a two way sync. DANGER WILL ROBINSON! Giving a newbie terminal commands can also be very dangerous, they could wipe out their user folder by mistake.

 

True, but in this case, the OP wasn't looking for two-way sync.

Also, the command I gave wouldn't wipe out the user folder, but there are Terminal commands that would.

 

Bill,
For lightroom, I have all my image files on an external hard drive. So, I can open LR from my MacBook or my IMac and work with either.
Just remember to sync the catalog and optimize it also.
I never had an issue.

 

Bill...
It would be a good idea to contact Kevinparis. He's the Apple/Mac guru....
don

 

The title says sync two macs I assume Bill wants to keep the libraries in sync.

Sure the command you gave wouldn't but it can be a dangerous place for someone who doesn't know what they are doing..

 

Ahh, okay, so it is a continuous sync after the fact. I didn't get that at first, sorry.

 

Hi BillN. I am an IT Network Administrator for my local NewsPaper and Mac's make up 70% of our workstation installed base. For what you want, LisaO has given you the right advice. MobileMe will sync everything effortlessly for all items you want except your Lightroom stuff. An added bonus with MobileMe is if you have an iPhone or plan on getting one, all your contacts, address book, iCalendar, bookmarks, mail accounts, etc will be sync'ed there as well. Anyway, back to Lightroom, for that, it is a bit more complicated. As LisaO suggested, ChronoSync to set up automatically or I use a free program called FileSync. It's best if you use these to read the set up instructions yourself so you can become familar with what they do and how they work. Finally, my solution for the lightroom syncing would be not to sync at all, but as someone suggested above, use an external hard drive and inside lightroom, set that volume up as your main library and you can then freely use that on your MCP, just plug it in and you have the same library on both machines.

Hope this helps some,

Jim

 

Your mileage may vary

I use an external 500GB HD for my image files (Aperture etc.) and it moves between home and work. I use 1Password to manage my passwords and I have the password key on Dropbox so I sync to between the various machines (it's free). I have all my bookmarks on a web service called Pinboard.

It seems to be working pretty well and I am about as mobile and machine independent as I have ever been. The caveat is keep that external HD backed up somewhere. Now mine is a Mac based solution but all the products are available for Windows or web based so it would work either way and if you had the drive formatted as FAT32 you could have this work between platforms.

Kevin