Data File Problems

[djriptide]

Thanks again Guys;

Here is what I've done today and yes, I have several back-ups of my Data file.

I created the SyncTest category on my main computer then copied the Data, (.oml) over to my back-up computer.  I opened my categories on the back-up computer and the SyncTest category was there.

Milky....I then went back to my main computer and performed the Easy Scan and there were no files that needed to be re-linked. I kept on going with it though not sure about what you mean "Once you have copied the music to the backup pc"  Do you mean I should recopy all of my music and overwrite the files on my backup computer?  Anyway, then I copied the new OML over to my backup computer but before re-linking I check all of my categories.  The titles to all of my songs were in the right place in my categories and all of the icons were lit up like they should play.  None of the songs would load or play however.

I continued on and did a re-link of unavailable items.  After the re-link the songs will play but most of the titles are gone from the categories.  There are a few songs left in some of the categories and they will play.  They also show the history of how many times I've played them etc.  Most of my categorized songs aren't there however.  I did and Easy Scan after that with the same results.

If I go to the "All" in the library the songs will play and they look to be all there.  But, as before, they show "never played" and no other information.

I've been racking my brain with this because as I said, I've probably done this stuff a couple hundred times in the past with my old Ots programs with no trouble at all.  I'm thinking of two big differences in my old Ots programs and the new OtsAV programs I now have.  I used the automatic beat mixing in my main computer on most of my songs which I haven't done on the backup computer because I read that it should be transfered with the OML file too.  Also, I have around 1500 Karaoke songs on the main computer with OtsAVDJPRO and wonder if that screws things up on the backup computer with OtsAVDJSILVER?

[Jigger]

I think Milky suggests that the music on the back up computer should be the same as your main computer IE same drive letter if your files reside on c ots labs ots files then try putting your music on the back up computer as the same, if I remember correctly the music on your back up is on desk top, if you can try and have the same path on the back up as your main computer your data file should work.

[Dr.J]

There's two things I'd recommend.

Firstly, when you copy your .oml file to the backup computer, do an easy-scan first, then do the relink unavailable files. I find this works better than performing them in the opposite order.

Secondly, when you say you used the "automatic beat mixing" on your main computer, did you use Ots Studio to automatically detect the BPM of your songs? If this is the case, when each file processed it was saved with a new timestamp, creating a different file than the one located on your backup computer. When you do an easy-scan on the backup computer with the "new" .oml file, each of those files will be considered different and won't relink to those from the main computer. Make sure you copy any of the affected audio files from your main computer to your backup computer. Overwriting should be fine, and it should now work like it previously did.

You can sort your directories by the last date edited to find a recently changed file on the main computer, then compare it to the timestamp of the same file on your backup computer - if they are different, you have the solution - if not, onto the next round.

For syncronizing your files, I recommend using an external HD and a program like SyncToy from Microsoft. It will allow you to copy only the recently edited files instead of overwriting all the files each time. There's lots of syncro software available, so choose one that works for you.

[Darryl]

Adding the beat info chunks on your main computer will cause this. The media files on the source and destination ate no longer the same so they cannot be re-linked. Ots Srudiocalculates a check sum of the files that is also stored in the mefia library. Editing the media files will change this checksun. You can verify this by opening the same file on the source and destination pc in ots studio. The check sum is displayed in the main file details in ots studio. Batch detecting abm is also editing the files.

[Darryl]

The word change would probably be better in this context. You have changed the files so they no longer have the same check sum so the re-link cannot match them.

[djriptide]

It Worked...!!!

Thanks all of you guys for your help.  Here's what I did, taking into account all of your suggestions:

I made new partitions of both my main and backup computers, with drive X:\Music

I copied all of my songs that had been automatically beat mixed by the new OtsAVDJPRO on my main computer over to my backup computer.

I copied the Data, (.oml) file from my main computer to my backup computer.

I did an Easy Scan on my backup computer.

I did a re-link of unavailable Items on the backup computer and everything now works as it should.

As a note, I hope this can be put into the help files of OtsAV so nobody has to go through this to get it right 

For 11 years I've been putting any new music files into folders as I add them to my computer.  I started with Transfer 1, Tranfer 2, Transfer 3, etc.  So yes, I will always be able to just update one folder for auto beat mixing and not go through my whole list each time.

Thanks again to all, and you've made this old DJ a very "Happy Camper!"

[Jigger]

Really glad you got it sorted.

[Dr.J]

Glad you got things working. And thanks for explaining the steps you took to resolve things, I'm sure it will help when someone else is having the same issues.