Backups and Transfers

[Stephen Martin]

I use TF5 at work and at home; could not find a good way to handle working with the same dbases (documents to TF5) at both locations.

After some lengthy battles and lots of data loss with TF5 trying Backup/Restore, Archive Import/Export, and plenty of gotchas associated with csv and xlsx where I would discover problems later down the road, I finally have a way that seems to work best for me. So, sharing…

Example:
Work on several forms inside of a TF5/Document(s) at home. When done, close TF5.
Go To: Finder / Go (menu drop-down with Option Key held down) / Library
…/Library/Containers/com.tapzapp.tapforms-mac/Data/Documents <— create a Desktop shortcut
Copy *.tapforms document(s) desired to Dropbox.
At work, copy from Dropbox to …/Library/Containers/com.tapzapp.tapforms-mac/Data/Documents
Launch Tap Forms 5.

Same procedure at the end of the day to share back to home Mac.

Notes:
– TF5 reads the contents of the …/com.tapzapp.tapforms-mac/Data/Documents folder into the Documents Manager on launch.
– The *.tapforms docs can be managed manually by “Modified Date” in Finder.
– Optional: Put your *.tapforms file on the Desktop or whatever.
— Skip the Document Manager by just double-clicking the file, editing, and closing the window.
– The documents stay intact complete with all forms, saved searches, etc etc etc and you don’ have to monkey around with archive, import/export, and other Ga Ga unless you want to.
– No mishaps with import overwrites, db IDs, record IDs, and such.
– WARNING: May not work well with linked records or such. FYI

<B>Works for me, but USE THIS ADVISE AT YOUR OWN RISK.</B>

[Sam Moffatt]

Is there a reason to not use an internet based CouchDB sync?

[Stephen Martin]

Implemented how, Sam?

[Sam Moffatt]

I’m sure I’m missing something obvious so please forgive me:

• There’s iCloud sync though it’s not my preference (slowwwww).
• There’s IBM Cloudant and it’s got a free 1GB hosting tier though after that it’s got a steep price increase.
• You can host your own CouchDB instance on a public cloud provider of some variety, Bitnami has templates I think.
• You can host your own CouchDB instance on a device inside your network and share it through your router using a dynamic DNS server.

If you have the iOS version, you could use P2P sync to shift changes from one location to the other as well, they just need to share a network.

[Sam Moffatt]

While I’m thinking about it, if you go into Preferences of your open document, you can click “Backup” on the first tab and it’ll create a ZIP archive of your document and it has a link to quickly open Finder for the backup directory. You could set up the backup directory to be your Dropbox folder and then it’ll automatically put a copy there. Added bonus is that it’s versioned by date so you can rollback if something goes wrong.

I’d keep the actual TF document off Dropbox but you can store the ZIP archive and then just extract it on either side with the changes.

That said, I’d really use the sync options that are available. iCloud works for simple documents, Cloudant works if you have less than 1GB per Tap Forms document and you can self host as well.

[Stephen Martin]

Hey Sam…

With any out-then-in, I kept running into issues with the IDs; archives and backups. The only trustworthy transfer to-from form or computer-to-computer transfer was “Records” export/import. And, then Record IDs seemed to snap me quite often.

The approach at the top of this thread has worked the best by far, and has taken little to no time to execute, so keeping it simple and going with what works. Thx.

[Stephen Martin]

Oh, and by the way, you CAN grab a document from the Library path/folder, and put it on the desktop, in Dropbox, a folder, or where-ever and double-click to open/edit/leave.

Have not had any problems yet, but not a lot of verification done using that method.

You will be skipping the use of the Document Manager, but that’s not important to me.

[Brendan]

Stephen, yes, that’s true, you can store and open a document from Dropbox. But it’s not recommended at all. Tap Forms internally uses the SQLite database engine. And it’s not recommended to store an SQLite database file in Dropbox for active utilization. There are issues with Dropbox that can cause corruption of the SQLite database file. Especially if multiple computers are writing to the same database file. You could end up with a situation where Dropbox updates the database file while its opened in Tap Forms and Tap Forms doesn’t know about the changes and then writes something else, thus corrupting the database file.

[Stephen Martin]

Thanks for the info, Brendan. Will avoid that method.

[Sam Moffatt]

I have some of my larger documents (largest being 20GB) on external storage and it works fine :) Helps my old iMac 2011 keep up a little better and thrash a little less by shifting the heavier docs off it’s main drive.

My suggestion was more around online sync solutions, is there a reason why you can’t use those?

[Stephen Martin]

Well, not sure how to answer. The online syncs I have been aware of have typically been great for static files, and not great for live files. Brendan’s waring above concurs with what I have always been told. I used to do it quite a bit, and never had any issues – but, read plenty of stories where others had experienced corruption. So, not sure what else to say on the subject. I am glad they work for you, Sam.

Feel like I have a decent enough solution now, so not looking further at the moment. Cheers.

[Sam Moffatt]

Oh I was referring to the built in sync solution built into Tap Forms. I personally prefer to the CouchDB/Cloudant approach as it’s the native sync for CBL though iCloud is an option.

Great news that this works for you though :)

[Stephen Martin]

Following up. For a number of weeks, I have been using the method I described in the first post. It has worked perfectly for me. Easy, fast, and gives me “versioning”. I have had no issues since taking this approach. Yes, a slight bit manual, but completely controllable as a very positive trade-off.

I have looked into the sync options available. Since my situation doesn’t fit any of the sync options well, this solution is still the winner for me.

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