10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog

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Thu, Jan 17 2008 at 7:30AM PST • Contributed by: meancode

This hint will be useful for those who use an abnormal amount of removable devices on their personal or work computer, or those who deploy 10.5 in a multi-machine environment. When you connect such devices, Time Machine asks if you'd like to use them for backing up. You can disable that warning -- just launch Terminal, and paste this line, then press Return:

defaults write com.apple.TimeMachine DoNotOfferNewDisksForBackup -bool YES

Time Machine will no longer ask to use the devices you connect.

[robg adds: To reverse this, you can repeat the above command with NO at the end instead of YES.]

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10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog | 4 comments | Create New Account

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10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog
Authored by: sfemet on Fri, Jan 18 2008 at 10:14AM PST

I've got 6 iMacs I "administer". All have multiple user accounts, some managed, some admin.

Do I need to do this in my admin account only or should I go into each user account and do it?

10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog
Authored by: baltwo on Fri, Jan 18 2008 at 8:08PM PST

Nice find, but more details on where you found the DoNotOfferNewDisksForBackup key would be more enlightening. A search of ADC's site for it comes up empty.

BTW, your command won't work, since the TM plist isn't in ~/Library/Preferences/—at least it isn't on my machine with TM turned off. You need to include the correct path:

defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.TimeMachine DoNotOfferNewDisksForBackup -bool YES

10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog
Authored by: macshome on Sun, Jan 20 2008 at 7:22AM PST

I posted this a few weeks ago on our site.

As with any preference like this I would strongly recommend it be deployed with policy so that you don't need to touch every mac.

---
http://www.afp548.com
Breaking my server to save yours.

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10.5: Disable the 'use this disk?' Time Machine dialog
Authored by: robg on Fri, Nov 20 2009 at 6:06AM PST

An anonymous submitter sent this in as a hint; I'm listing it here as an alternative to this hint:

This has to do with Time Machine and presenting the dialogue when a suitable drive is mounted. If a file name ".com.apple.timemachine.donotpresent" is in the root directory of the Hard Drive, then it seems to disable the dialogue.

One issue seems to be that to make this file appear, you have to first connect the drive, which will generate the warning dialog ... and if you say "no," then this value is set anyway (so it won't be asked again for that drive).

-rob.

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