Using Hazel to Delete Time Machine Backups

[skeskali]

Hi,

I'm new to Hazel and this forum. I'd like to use Hazel to delete Time Machine backups that are older than 6 months from my external hard drive (where the backups are kept). When I create the rule, I have this rule attached to my backups folder on the external HD:



When I run the rule, nothing happens. I checked the Hazel log and got this error:

Code: Select all

2016-05-25 09:06:16.262 hazelworker[7601] 2015-11-10-000220: Rule Delete Old Backups matched.
2016-05-25 09:06:16.262 hazelworker[7601] Error moving file from /Volumes/My Book/Backups.backupdb/Cecily’s iMac/2015-11-10-000220 to /Volumes/My Book/.Trashes/501/2015-11-10-000220: Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=13 "Permission denied"
2016-05-25 09:06:16.263 hazelworker[7601] [Error] Move failed: Could not move file

What am I doing wrong/leaving out? Thanks for any help.

[Mr_Noodle]

Time Machine backups require special permissions to remove, IIRC. Also, moving them to the trash can be resource intensive.

It might be better to let Time Machine manage old backups. If you really need the extra space on the drive, you could try re-partitioning the drive giving it a smaller part of the drive to use. A bit riskier though but just a thought.