How to prevent Spotlight from Indexing Backup Drives?

[minckster]

Originally Posted by dnanian

While I recognize that there are some users on this thread having trouble with Privacy, it does work in my testing. If the copy fails, there could be problems, but otherwise it should work.

That's my experience. It works fine except when I stop a backup before SuperDuper restores my privacy settings. In response, when I cancel a backup, I go to Spotlight's preferences to ensure that the backup drive is still in the privacy tab. If I'm feeling particularly paranoid, I eject the backup drive and remount it before checking Spotlight's privacy tab.

Would it be feasible to restore the privacy setting when quitting an incomplete backup?

Here's a hint: If Spotlight indexes the apps on your backup drive, the "Open With" menu may double up for each app even after you restore the backup drive to Spotlight's privacy tab. Here's the command to fix that up:

/System/Library/Frameworks/ApplicationServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -f -domain local -domain system -domain user "/Applications"

I always reboot immediately afterwards, but I'm not sure that's necessary.