Mac OS Upgrade lost folders

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Mac OS Upgrade lost folders

I had to update my MBP (mid-2014) to new(er) software so I could run tax software. I was on High Sierra, which was the last OS my iMac (mid-2011) could support. I made a backup, dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's. I did everything correctly I thought. I upgraded to Big Sur. I lost all my files that were in the root of the directory on my startup disk. I brought up Migration Assistant and told it to restore all of the "Other" files (all my user stuff came over fine in the upgrade), and it restored 311K files, supposedly. Finish rebooting, check the root folder, they're all still gone.

That 311K files is probably correct, that was probably all the stuff I have in that one ginormous folder, but it's GONE! It's still on the Backup drive (backed up via Time Machine), I am sure, but how in HECK do I get it back on this machine once I'm running Big Sur?

Earlier Mac models

Posted on Apr 4, 2023 10:53 AM

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Answer 1

Apr 4, 2023 11:17 AM in response to scottfrommanhattan beach

Ach - never mind. Found the files. Was reading some other posts about losing files during OS upgrade. I found this one:

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/371852/where-does-the-upgrade-to-macos-catalina-and-big-sur-move-root-directory-fil

That had pretty much same problem, only his files weren't in exactly the same loc. I simply figured mine must have been moved SOMEWHERE, so I used terminal to go to root, then did a "find . - name <my directory name> -ls" and I found it here:

/System/Volumes/Data

Only when you view that in the Finder, "Data" shows up with the name of your hard drive on your machine. My folder got MOVED there as a repository for things the upgrade didn't know how to handle.

So - question now for Apple: WHY IN HECK CAN'T I MAKE CHANGES TO THE ROOT FOLDER ON MY HARD DRIVE? IT'S MY FRICKING MACHINE!

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Mac OS Upgrade lost folders

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