Apple OS X Migration Assistant - making it work

Over the years I've had a number of Apple Mac(intosh) computers, and up until recently most of them were still working and useful. But time marches on and what once was a great machine is just barely keeping up. So the pile of old computers looking for new purposes was getting excessive. During my downsizing exercise I've had to migrate my wife's and my home directories to a new Mac Mini. In both instances I used the Migration Assistant utility, and in both instances I ran into difficulty.

The setup was as follows: a Mac Mini running Mavericks direct connected via standard ethernet cable to -  in one instance a 15" MacBook Pro running Mavericks and the other a 12" PowerBook G4 running Snow Leopard.

After initiating and connecting both machines successfully the Mac Mini would wait eternally for the laptops to show, but no luck. Fortunately I'm not the only one with this problem. A Google search turned up a number of articles. Apparently there is a bug which results in the disk in my laptops not mounting properly under Migration Assistant. I found this linked blog post to be helpful, and it includes a better discription of the problem.

http://www.hardturm.ch/luz/2014/02/fixing-os-x-10-9-mavericks-migration-from-external-volume/

The following steps are from Lukas Zeller's blog. I have quoted them here to save you from having to flip between both blogs.

"So the solution was as follows:

• Enable ssh login for the target machine: Set the checkbox in “System preferences”->”Sharing”->”Remote login. To the right, there will be a green dot and a text saying “Remote login: On – to login to this computer remotely, type “ssh user@192.168.1.11“.

You will be typing the "ssh user@x.x.x.x" command into the Mac "Terminal" application.

Just be aware the IP address 192.168.1.11 shown may not be the right one for you if you have both wifi and hardwired connections active such as I did. You will have to look in "System Preferences -> "Network" -> click on ethernet if that's how you've connected your machines. Or to simplify the situation, you could just turn off the wireless on both machines before starting.

If your computers are not connected to a network router with ethernet cables (i.e. - normally on wifi), but directly to each other, you will run into the following. Each machine will self-assign an IP address which may or may not be similar enough to work. So pick a machine to keep the self-assigned IP address then go to the other machine and type in the same first three numbers and only change the last one. I just increment by one. So for example 192.168.1.11 on one and 192.168.1.12 on the other. (to do this you will have to change the ethernet address option from DHCP (most common) to manually on the second machine to activate the IP address field to make the change) Then carry on...

• This [ed - "ssh user@xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx"] is exactly what you need to type on another computer in the same network to log in via ssh (preferably a Mac, BSD or Linux box, but anything capable of ssh, even a WinXP with putty will do, if you know how to use that). You need to enter your target computer’s admin account password to get access.

• Now, back on the target machine, start the Migration Assistant, enter the password when asked and confirm terminating all other apps. The welcome screen of Migration Assistant appears. This is the point where Migration Assistant has unmounted all volumes.

• Go back to the ssh session on the other computer. Here you can enter the commands to mount a disk. In my case (original HD, connected via external USB housing) it was simply:

• sudo diskutil list # showing the available disks. Usually /dev/disk0 is the internal disk, /dev/disk1 the first external one.
• sudo diskutil mountDisk /dev/disk1

These commands will also be typed into the Terminal application as above except for the "/dev/disk1" which will depend on your machine. You only need to mount the disk, don't worry about the partitions listed for the disk by the 'diskutil' command.

• Now, on the target computer, click through the  Migration Assistant dialogs step by step as usual, and everything works as expected :-)

This worked great for me once I ironed out the network connections for the computers. Good luck.

An Introduction to the Obvious

The old⁽¹⁾ saying "hind sight is 20/20" seems to apply more and more to my undertakings these days. And often upon completion of a project or chore my reflections reveal that the solution should have been obvious from the start - should I have read the instructions more carefully, taken my time or generally paid better attention. As such I often find my final solution/answer a statement of the obvious. Of course I then have the benefit of my experiences gained during execution. Such is the inspiration of this blog. To help others achieve the same enlightenment of the obvious ... just a bit more quickly.

⁽¹⁾ can't be that old as visual acuity measurement originated in the mid-19th century