First, a few notes thereon: Time Machine is only available for OS X 10.5. If you've got any other configuration, this will not work for you.

Ok, I have 10.5 - what is it, why do I want it and how do I make it work?

What: Time Machine (TM for the rest of this document) is an automatic sequential backup system built in to 10.5. What this means is that if you change a document, it gets backed up (by default, TM backs up your entire hard drive - you may or may not want to do this; it can be restricted as needed).

Why: It is a painless way to back up your files. Essentially, set it and forget it.

Ok, you've convinced me - now how do I make this work?

There are a few steps involved. First, Teba is a SAMBA object - which is supported by TM, but not in the default configuration. To enable this support (which I've been testing since Tesla showed up), go to Terminal and enter the following command:

defaults write com.apple.systempreferences TMShowUnsupportedNetworkVolumes 1

Ok, you've now enabled SAMBA support for TM.

You'll have to manually create a backup image for TM to push your files to; there are a couple of steps:

1. 1.In Terminal, enter the following command: ifconfig en0 | grep ether
   

This will spit out a line looking something like this: ether 00:1f:5b:36:52:cc

2. Again in Terminal, you'll need to enter the following command (this creates a sparse partition, which TM will then use as a target on Teba for your backups).

hdiutil create -size 100g -fs HFS+J -volname "Tesla_backup" Tesla_backup_001f5b3652cc.sparsebundle

Ok, that command needs some explaining: you're using the hdiutil command to create a sparse partition. To do this, you specify the size of the partition (here, you'll see that we've got the -size flag followed by 100g [100GB]. That can be changed as needed - I'd say 250g is a good size for a backup - you'll be a while filling that. Next, the -fs flag is used to declare the filesystem used (here, we're using HFS+J, the Journaled HFS filesystem, which is OS X's default). Next, we declare the volume name using -volname, followed by the desired name in quotes (no spaces, please). The last part of this command is the actual name of the sparsebundle itself: the volname, followed by the computer's MAC address, which is what you got earlier, without the colons, followed by the .sparsebundle suffix (e.g, Tesla_backup_001f5b3652cc.sparsebundle).

Once you've created the sparsebundle, drag it to your individual share on Teba - not to the tonglab one. It'll take a second to transfer.

Once you've got it on Teba, go to System Preferences < Time Machine. Enable TM and point it at your Teba share. You'll probably want to restrict what it actually backs up (backing up data is good, backing up your 50GB of elevator music or your applications is less good) - hit the Options button to do this.

Then, sit back and let your computer do its thing. If you've got problems with this or TM starts doing strange things, let me know and we'll fix it.