You should make sure that this feature is not enabled on the volume that you plan to be used by the Time Machine server: To make this easier, a special preference setting might have been activated that causes file ownership on the entire volume to be ignored. In some cases, macOS assumes that volumes on external disks are used to transfer data between different Macs. If you like to enable encryption for network-based Time Machine backups, you will be able to specify this later on the client side. You don’t need to choose an encrypted format. You can alternatively select Format: Mac OS Extended (Journaled), but this is not recommended.
Preparing a new empty disk drive for use with the Time Machine server WARNING: You must never try to convert a local Time Machine disk to APFS format! This will cause complete loss of all backups stored on that disk and will also make it incompatible with future local backups. It can also convert a used volume which contains data in Mac OS Extended (Journaled) format to APFS if necessary. You can use Disk Utility to prepare a new disk for use with the Time Machine server. Other file servers that are part of macOS (for the protocols NFS, SFTP, or WebDAV) won’t be affected. The check mark Share files and folders using … will automatically reflect that and enable a single or both file servers accordingly. The application automatically checks whether you are using SMB only, or whether you have additionally enabled AFP, either for Time Machine sharing or other file service purposes configured with System Preferences. Only clients running macOS Sierra 10.12 or later can access a modern Time Machine server, no matter whether AFP is active. You can choose for each backup destination compatible with AFP whether you like to use the older protocol or not.Ĭhoosing the combination HFS+ format with AFP sharing has no influence on the compatibility with Time Machine sharing at the moment, however. AFP typically gives you more speed but less security. If you are using the older HFS+ standard for a backup destination, it will be possible to additionally enable the deprecated Apple Filing Protocol (AFP) to share the folder on the network. Always use separate volumes, or even better, separate disk drives for local Time Machine and network-based Time Machine. You must never use a local Time Machine volume (a disk where the server itself stores its own Time Machine backups) as destination for the network backups of other Macs. It is recommended to use an empty disk which does not contain any other data as work folder for your Time Machine server. Preparing a Destination FolderĪll disk volumes formatted with either the Apple File System (APFS) or the older format Mac OS Extended (Journaled), also called HFS+, can be used as target for network-based Time Machine backups.
Remove all items which should not be accessible from the network. You can review the complete list of shared objects using the table at System Preferences > Sharing > File Sharing > Shared Folders. Important: Enabling macOS file services may also share other files with the network, not only the folder(s) for the Time Machine server.