Future of SuperDuper? (in light of Leopard Time Machine)

[backerupper3160]

I can't help wondering, what is the future of SuperDuper in light of the "Time Machine" feature in the next feature of the Mac OS (10.5, "Leopard").

Admittedly it's not due out till next spring, but does anyone (who knows somewhat what they're talking about) have any predictions? (will SD become redundant in other words?)

Not trying to be a doomsayer, just looking ahead.

[hukalaki]

By my understanding Time Machine is an incremental backup utility, non-bootable. Might be great, but I want a clone of my machine, updated daily. SD does that (as well as incremental), and is bootable to boot.

so I think it's two different audiences. TM for folks who never backup, and SD for those who value being able to go right back to work.

Nonetheless TM may make folks stop looking at good 3rd party solutions--let's hope not.

[dnanian]

Hi, backerupper3160. I wrote a post about this at Shirt Pocket Watch, so take a look.

[backerupper3160]

Originally Posted by dnanian

Hi, backerupper3160. I wrote a post about this at Shirt Pocket Watch, so take a look.

Thanks that was helpful.

[trevyn]

Incidentally, this:

...we’re not angry, and Apple has no obligation to leave market opportunities for independent developers, notify us that things are coming, or pretty much anything else.

made me buy my SD license. It's refreshing to see a developer not get angry at Apple in the face of competition.

I was out of town for WWDC this year, so I'm not up on the NDA specifics, but what I'd ideally like to see is Time Machine doing transparent versioning with the free space on the boot drive, and SD making periodic images to a network volume, just like it does now.

[dnanian]

We'll all have to wait and see what TM does when it actually gets released!

[denke]

Dave,

I agree with what you said on your blog. When I first read about Time Machine, I thought it would be the perfect complement to SD - well, more precisely, I thought it exactly the complement I want to SD.

Btw, that Taiko is handsome! May you have many happy years together!

[dnanian]

Thanks, denke -- he's at my feet being rather rambunctious right now!

[davecc]

I don't think Dave has anything to worry about with TimeMachine. If TimeMachine is anything like Spotlight, SuperDuper will have a long life. I have used SuperDuper for quite some time and never had any issues with it. Why Change a proven backup method with your very valuable data?

[naftalim]

I have read the blog article about the complementary role that SD plays with Time Machine. My question is, how does this work physically? Do I have 2 partitions, (or 2 drives) one where SD backs up, and one where Time Machine does its thing? I don't see them working off the same backup device?

[dnanian]

You'd have two drives or two partitions, yes. You can share a single partition with an image, but I think it's much more convenient to have a separate, bootable partition.