Messages

931

General Discussion / moving network database to another server

« on: 2011-05-25 20:42:38 »

> Our question is, what are the steps to take to Install software on new server
> and then access photos where they are currently and then Move Photos to new
> server from within thumbsplus. Then open database in access and change values.

Well, where you install ThumbsPlus doesn't really matter (on the server or separately on clients) - as long as it has access to your database file and to the image files. So, you can just download ThumbsPlus v7 sp2 from [link=http://www.cerious.com/archive.shtml]http://www.cerious.com/archive.shtml[/link] and install it wherever you prefer to have it. Don't forget to enter your registration name and code (TP doesn't support network use in evaluation mode).

The location of your database file (thumbs.td4) is not really important either. If it's a shared database, it should be on the server in a folder that all the users have read/write access to. In ThumbsPlus, you use File | Database | Open Database to select the database file that you want to work with (by default it will open the database that the installer just made, which is not your existing database!). Also, be very sure that you have a backup of your existing database.

Before we go on, you should verify a few settings and change them if necessary:

[*]Options | Preferences | General: Allow Folder Operations must be On.
[*]Options | Preferences | Thumbnails: Automatically Remove Orphans must be Off.
[*]Options | Preferences | Thumbnails: Make Thumbnails Automatically must be Off.[/list]

If nothing has changed yet about the location of the photos, I don't think you will have to do any manual editing of the database. You should just be able to look them up through ThumbsPlus' tree panel (supposedly through My Network Places or a mapped drive letter), and it should show you their existing thumbnails.

If (IF!) that is correct, you can simply lookup the new server in the tree (again through through My Network Places or a mapped drive letter -  use the same route that your fellow users will be using) and move the photos there using drag-and-drop or through File | Move.

One thing to keep in mind: If the photo drive in the new server should have the same volume label as the old drive, and you can't change it beforehand, I think you should first turn this setting 'on' to prevent that ThumbsPlus gets these volumes mixed up: Options | Preferences | Disks & Folders | Match network volumes using share names.

Afterwards, when all files have been moved, you may want to perform File | Database | Compact to physically remove the old records of the moved files from the database.


ps:  if the old thumbnails do not show when you look up the image files, things get more complicated because something (e.g. share name, volume label, folder structure) must have changed between when it still worked and today. If the cause is not the folder structure, what you can do is to create a new database, lookup the image files and make a thumbnail for just one of the images (by selecting it and pressing F3). Then open that database in MS Access, go to the table named 'Volume' and make a note of all the field values for that volume. Then open your existing database in Access, again go to the Volume table, lookup the volume on which the images used to reside and update its values manually (with those of the new volume, where they are now). After that, when you open the DB in ThumbsPlus, it should recognize the image files again and show the existing thumbnails,so you can move them elsewhere.

Well, I hope this explanation is not too fuzzy.. it's a complicated subject. If you think something is not quite right, please let me know and provide as many details as possible.

932

General Discussion / moving network database to another server

« on: 2011-05-23 12:05:12 »

> We will be upgrading our network hardware. How do we move the database over to the new server and keep all of our Keywords intact. The location of the photos will also be changing.
>
> Can this be done?

Yes. And it's good that you ask this question, because ThumbsPlus uses the host name, drive volume labels and the folder paths to match your image files to the  thumbnail records in its database. Change any one of them from outside of ThumbsPlus, and it can no longer identify the files and match them to its records (note: actually, with files that reside on a network server, the drive volume labels may be ignored, depending on your settings).

The location of the database itself isn't important, as long as your users can continue to access it.

There are basically two ways to keep your files synched with the database:

[*] By editing the database (if you have MS Access) to update the values that have changed in the process of upgrading the server (host name, drive volume labels, folder paths). Always keep a backup of the database!
[*] By initially keeping the configuration of the new hardware as close as possible to that of the old situation: same server name, same drive volume labels, same folder paths. Then use ThumbsPlus (with full admin rights to the server) to change the volume labels of the drives in question and to move the files to the desired new folders. That way, ThumbsPlus can update its thumbnail records at the same time that it is making these changes for you. It cannot change the server name though, so if you want to do that, you still have to manually edit its name in the database. Also, volume labels may not be relevant, depending on your setting for Options | Preferences | Disks & Folders | "Match network volumes using share names".[/list]

> We are currently using version 7 but do have version 8 to upgrade to, would this be the time to do the upgrade as well?

ThumbsPlus v7 sp2 is very reliable and fully functional, but with ThumbsPlus v8 the developers are still working hard to iron out the last few wrinkles. If you don't really need features like unicode support, I'd stick with v7 for a while longer.

I had to write this in some haste - if anything is unclear, please let me know. Also, I'm not a Cerious employee (I'm with CopyCats, their Dutch reseller) so if you want to hear from them, I hope one of them jumps in here too.

Regards,

-Daan-

933

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / View window: Menubar disappears

« on: 2011-05-13 08:47:40 »

I've had that too at one point, but couldn't reproduce it. Glad to hear it wasn't just me :)

More worryingly I've also had a situation where I could no longer use 'scan folder' to produce thumbnails for one particular folder. It contained no strange files and its subfolders (and any other folders) would thumbnail just fine. When I made thumbnails for each file individually (F3), they would disappear again as soon as I'd leave and re-renter the folder. Repairing the database did not work, but removing all thumbnails from it and re-scanning the folders did.

934

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / View window: Full screen mode shows menu + status line

« on: 2011-05-10 22:54:45 »

This one shouldn't be too hard to reproduce. It happens with a default configuration on my XP sp3 system:

[*]Open an image that's smaller than your screen
[*]Press F5 to see it full screen. Note that only your image is visible - no other screen elements.
[*]Press F5 again to return to the previous window size. So far so good..
[*]Now press Space to advance to the next image
[*]Press F5, and notice how the menu and the status line are visible in fullscreen mode.
[/list]


While I have your attention.. :)  the following is a bit too generic and minor to bring up separately, but there's quite a lot of flashing and blinking of scroll bars and other window elements going on, and last-minute adjustments to the centering of images, when I do simple things like advancing to the next image or pressing F6 and going back to reduced-to-window view. When I press F5 to switch from maximized window to full screen mode, I get a brief glimpse at my desktop or any other open windows. In all, it's as if the viewer is rapidly making adjustments to itself and updating the screen in real-time, instead of quietly preparing these things in the background, which would give the program a more 'quiet' and solid look & feel.

935

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / Different Thumbs.ini file for the same user? [OK]

« on: 2011-05-10 17:48:14 »

> I'll try to think and implement the best/most reasonable solution for the next build.

That would be great!

I don't know how complicated this would be, but for even more flexibility (than only a command line option that loads a specific .ini file), maybe you could allow users to redirect sections of the ini file to a different file. The Total Commander file manager does this, mainly to allow system administrators to dictate some important common settings to users, whilst leaving them free to configure other aspects of the program.

It works like this: When a section contains a command "RedirectSection=", the program reads and writes the relevant settings from and to that other .ini file. It supports environment variables like %APPDATA% and %USERNAME% ([link=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment_variable#Default_Values_on_Microsoft_Windows]full list here)[/link], in addition to a few program-specific variables that point to the program's home dir, the dir where its .ini is, et cetera.

936

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / Import from TP7

« on: 2011-05-09 23:15:02 »

Bob, what may have gone wrong with your first attempt at the time is that maybe you did not export the actual thumbnail (image) data. That takes up heaps of space and the exported text file could easily go over any 2GB or 4GB filesize limits. However, with offline media, you have to include those thumbnail data, or else you'll have to re-scan all those discs to re-create the thumbnails in your new database.

(which, as an aside, would give you an opportunity to check if those aging discs can actually still be read; and make backups if you're beginning to get read-errors)

Still, you should be able to export those thumbnails from TP7, maybe a few discs at a time, and import them into TP8.

Once you have done that and you want to split your new database into two (one for online media and one for offline media), you can simply exit TP and copy your database file, and then relaunch TP and use it to remove all 'online' thumbnails from the first database, and all 'offline' thumbnails from the second database.

937

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / Different Thumbs.ini file for the same user?

« on: 2011-05-09 18:54:45 »

> I hope they allow for this in future updates.

Me too. There are many more settings that one may want to adjust to the database (and the type of images/documents/media in it), so I think it would be great if we could specify the ini file on the command line too.

938

ThumbsPlus v7-v9 Questions / Different Thumbs.ini file for the same user?

« on: 2011-05-09 16:46:53 »

> Now, in TP V8x, any DB I open shares the Thumbs.ini file, and thus the "remembered" folder is always the folder I was in the last time I closed TP regardless of the DB.

Yes, unless you define a specific path under Opt | Pref | Startup, but that would then be used with all databases..
 
> Is there anyway I can get this functionality back?  Like specifying a different
> ini file?  Or a different settings directory?

Unfortunately the old -i command line parameter no longer seems to work..

Well, one possible solution might be to create multiple .ini files (one for each database, with the desired StartupFolder= value) and then use as many corresponding batch files that do something like this when they launch TP:

Startdogs.bat:

copy /y dogs.ini thumbs8.ini
start /wait "C:\Thumbs8\Bin\thumbs8.exe" "f:\mydatabases\dogs.tpdb8"
copy /y thumbs8.ini dogs.ini

Likewise, for a cats database you'd create a Startcats.bat like this:

copy /y cats.ini thumbs8.ini
start /wait "C:\Thumbs8\Bin\thumbs8.exe" "f:\mydatabases\cats.tpdb8"
copy /y thumbs8.ini cats.ini
 
- The first line would replace thumbs8.ini with the ini file that belongs with the database that you'll be using.
- The second line launches TP with that database, then waits until TP has exited.
- The third line would update the ini file for any changes made in settings during this session.

Finally, on your desktop, you would create a shortcut to each batchfile.

Note: I didn't test this, and you'll want to use full path names to the ini files.

I guess the biggest drawback of this approach would be that when you tweak or refine settings in ThumbsPlus, they'll only be saved for the current database/ini set. I'm sure that more elegant solutions are possible, but hopefully this can be a practical solution for some users.