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erniej

Synchronization between two computers

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I have not been able to figure out a successful way to easily synchronize two machines so that I can input data to either machine at any time and have them synchronize the data to the latest and greatest. Is such a move possible.

I have tried backup and restore from one machine to the other but it seems not to get all of the information and I am not sure why.

 

As a wish list item: a utility that synchronizes in time order so that information entered at the earliest time is entered first then the later data either adds to or overwrites.

 

This old head is just getting too full of computer. :(

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I use a shareware back-up and data synchronisation program called "Second Copy". I've been using it for about a year now without a hitch for my TMG files (or other files either, for that matter). It means I can easily change from my desktop when working in the office to a laptop when on the road. I set second copy to automatically synchronise between the two every 2 hours and on start-up and shut-down, so the two computers are always "in-sync".

 

pktropics

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I use a shareware back-up and data synchronisation program called "Second Copy". I've been using it for about a year now without a hitch for my TMG files (or other files either, for that matter). It means I can easily change from my desktop when working in the office to a laptop when on the road. I set second copy to automatically synchronise between the two every 2 hours and on start-up and shut-down, so the two computers are always "in-sync".

 

pktropics

Thanks for the input. I was wondering more about use of two computers between synchs with each having had some information added and perhaps to the same individual. Would or does it handle something like that? That's not very clear I guess. Let's try again. If I were to add something to individual #100 on my desktop and before the two units synch up I then made some changes to individual #100 on my lap top would it be able to handle that type of change. I hope that is a little clearer.

Edited by erniej

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I was wondering more about use of two computers between synchs with each having had some information added and perhaps to the same individual. Would or does it handle something like that?

No, not file copy system, nor use of backup and restore, will sort out the individual changes made in two copies of your Project. You can only make changes to one copy, then copy the entire project to the other computer.

 

But, if the two computers are linked by a network, you can keep the project on one of them and access it from either computer. Some folks have reported success keeping their project on a removable "thumb" drive, and moving that drive between the two computers.

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No, not file copy system, nor use of backup and restore, will sort out the individual changes made in two copies of your Project. You can only make changes to one copy, then copy the entire project to the other computer.

 

But, if the two computers are linked by a network, you can keep the project on one of them and access it from either computer. Some folks have reported success keeping their project on a removable "thumb" drive, and moving that drive between the two computers.

Thanks have tried that but found that the transfer was not particularly great. Some things seemed to get lost. My next move is to use two thumbs in different drives and see what results I can get. Thanks for all of your suggestions and help.

Ernie Jenkins

 

Thanks have tried that but found that the transfer was not particularly great. Some things seemed to get lost. My next move is to use two thumbs in different drives and see what results I can get. Thanks for all of your suggestions and help.

Ernie Jenkins

I am currently looking at a program that purports to be able to do what I want. If so will come back and provide details. It seems to offer the "merge" blended screen when running into something it doesn't understand.

If I were more organized I wouldnn't have to worry about such things but tend to do things as they come up and on what evere machine is around. Has made for some colossal messes of my own making.

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I'm not sure if second copy will "merge" in the way you want - I've never been game to try it! I think it simply updates from the latest copy; but it does go either way - that is, from computer A to Computer B and vice versa. depending upon which computer it finds the latest copy of the file. It won't update an open file, so if you are working on the same file on two computers simultaneously, it won't do anything till both files are closed. You would be better to network the computers.

 

pktropics

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Hi

 

This is not precisely my area of expertise, but based upon what experience I do have in the database world, I can't conceive that there is any generic software out there that will do what you want. I believe that it would have to be a truly custom piece of software that had been written specifically to handle the job of keeping the same TMG project on multiple computers in sync. This is partly because such a piece of software wouldn't be able to compare the same data files between the 2 PCs to see what has changed, but rather would have to compare each individual record in each data file. This would not be a trivial undertaking. Consider the complexities of the task:

 

1. A TMG project consists of a great many files that are working in conjunction with each other. A change to a piece of data in one file can affect a great many other files.

2. A new record can have been added on computer A that does not yet exist on computer B or vice versa.

3. An existing record can have been deleted on computer A but not on computer B or vice versa.

4. An existing record can have been modified on both computer A and computer B with totally different modifications.

5. An existing record can have been modified on computer A and deleted on computer B or vice versa.

6. Every time a record in TMG is changed, all of the tags, exhibits, sources and repositories that are tied to it are potentially impacted also.

 

And this is just a few of the considerations that would have to be taken into account. I suspect that it would take a pretty spiffy piece of custom code to accomplish what you have in mind without running great risk of demolishing your data.

 

Just my opinion, for what it's worth.

Mike

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Thanks have tried that but found that the transfer was not particularly great. Some things seemed to get lost.

Which "transfer" method did you use? I'd be very interested in what you found to be lost. Nothing should be lost, unless you modify both copies of the Project. If you do that, the changes to one of them will certainly be lost.

My next move is to use two thumbs in different drives and see what results I can get.

Two thumbs? I think you will get the same results if you enter data on both of them - there will be no way to consolidate the seperate entries. Better I think to use one thumb so you have only one copy of the project to work with.

I am currently looking at a program that purports to be able to do what I want. If so will come back and provide details. It seems to offer the "merge" blended screen when running into something it doesn't understand.

I'm with Mike - you may find a program that keeps the latest copy of each file. But that's not what's needed. You would need something that digs into each file and finds the latest copy of each individual record in each file. And, as Mike points out, somehow figures out how to deal with two different changes to the same record. I don't believe you will find such a thing.

If I were more organized I wouldnn't have to worry about such things but tend to do things as they come up and on what evere machine is around.

Well, I'm afraid you just can't do that. :( You either need to have both computers access the same copy of the project over a network, or you need to only enter data on one of the computers and then sync them before entering data on the other.

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Which "transfer" method did you use? I'd be very interested in what you found to be lost. Nothing should be lost, unless you modify both copies of the Project. If you do that, the changes to one of them will certainly be lost.

 

Two thumbs? I think you will get the same results if you enter data on both of them - there will be no way to consolidate the seperate entries. Better I think to use one thumb so you have only one copy of the project to work with.

 

I'm surprised (and a little saddened) to hear that thumb drive storage doesn't work. I haven't tried it myself, but I would think it should work.

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I have not been able to figure out a successful way to easily synchronize two machines so that I can input data to either machine at any time and have them synchronize the data to the latest and greatest.

 

I use a 80 gig USB hard drive to keep my data and external exhibits. I just move the drive between computers and always have the correct project. Backups are to each computers hard drive, giving me backups on at least 2 computers

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I really like that idea, Barbara. That's a no muss, no fuss approach. I have a 150 gig USB that is hooked to my desktop PC that would do the job quite nicely, so I'm going to give that a try. Are there any "issues" that I need to be aware of in moving my data to the external drive? Exhibits aren't an issue yet, because my project is pretty new, and I haven't begun attching them yet. I will be using external exhibits when I do.

 

Mike

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I really like that idea, Barbara. That's a no muss, no fuss approach. I have a 150 gig USB that is hooked to my desktop PC that would do the job quite nicely, so I'm going to give that a try. Are there any "issues" that I need to be aware of in moving my data to the external drive? Exhibits aren't an issue yet, because my project is pretty new, and I haven't begun attching them yet. I will be using external exhibits when I do.

 

Mike

 

OK, what would be the difference between a thumb drive and an external USB drive? They both work through USB; it's just that one has a physical HD spinning and the other is pure e-memory.

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Hi Phil

I don't see any particular difference between the two. And thumb drives have the advantage of being small, light, cheap, and easy to carry around. Their biggest downside to me is their (current) relatively small storage capacity and their vulnerability when sticking out of most USB ports. Personally, I'm a wee bit prejudiced against thumb drives for the heavy duty use that mine would get as a main location for my TMG data because my thumb drives have had a fairly high failure rate.

 

Mike

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Thanks to everyone for a lively and interesting discussion of what I originally thought would be a relatively simple process. When I mentioned two thumbs, i was picturing one on one machine and one on the other, then putting both onto the same machine and merging the files. And that was just a thought.

This kind of shows you how far we have come, back in the 70's I had a makeshift genealogy program running on a DEC VAX and did this operation all of the time. The output looked like trash but the work was done. Now the output is gorgeous.

Still prefer TMG over most other programs for everything I do.

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I use a 80 gig USB hard drive to keep my data and external exhibits. I just move the drive between computers and always have the correct project. Backups are to each computers hard drive, giving me backups on at least 2 computers

Duh! Now why didn't I think of that? An excellent, elegant, easy solution to exactly what I need to do. Thanks for stating the obvious Barbara. :)

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I'm surprised (and a little saddened) to hear that thumb drive storage doesn't work. I haven't tried it myself, but I would think it should work.

Phil - I didn't say thumb drives wouldn't work, in fact I suggested that as a possible solution. What I said was using two of them - one on each computer - and entering data in both, will cause the same problems as having two copies of the project on the computer's hard drives.

 

When I mentioned two thumbs, i was picturing one on one machine and one on the other, then putting both onto the same machine and merging the files.

That's really the same as having two copies of the project on the two computer's hard drives. The problem is there is no way to "merge" the two copies and have the latest data from each retained.

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Phil - I didn't say thumb drives wouldn't work, in fact I suggested that as a possible solution. What I said was using two of them - one on each computer - and entering data in both, will cause the same problems as having two copies of the project on the computer's hard drives.

 

Sorry - I realize that, but I just hit "reply" and yours was the last post. Actually, it was in answer to erniej saying thumbs hadn't worked well for him. Personally, since my once wonderful laptop (1GHz w/ 20GB HD) is now on the slower and smaller storage side of the spectrum, I have been toying with the idea of a USB HD myself. I use thumb drives right now for backup and have had no problems, but my data represents work going back to 1975, so I'm in no hurry to lose it. That happened once with a HD crash 15 years ago, and I only saved it by having everything printed on hard copy. Today that would be nearly impossible.

 

Now, if I used a USB HD, would I put the entire TMG on it, or just the data files?

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But, if the two computers are linked by a network, you can keep the project on one of them and access it from either computer.

 

Just to add my support for this idea. I have me project files on me desktop but can access them on my laptop though the network. This way I'm only ever modifying one location and I don't have to worry about where I worked last. As an extra security measure I keep my backups on both computers so even if one of them croaks I have a back-up on the other.

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Now, if I used a USB HD, would I put the entire TMG on it, or just the data files?

I'd do just the data files. While there are supposed to be some ways to install programs so they are "portable" I don't know of anyone who as successfully done that with TMG. And, in this case, I don't see any advantage to trying to make it work.

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I use a 80 gig USB hard drive to keep my data and external exhibits. I just move the drive between computers and always have the correct project. Backups are to each computers hard drive, giving me backups on at least 2 computers

 

Barbara,

 

I like your suggestion of using an external USB hard drive. Can you give me a summary of the steps you used to move your project(s) to the USB drive?

 

Thanks,

John Fields

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I like your suggestion of using an external USB hard drive. Can you give me a summary of the steps you used to move your project(s) to the USB drive?

I would suggest:

 

1. Open TMG.

 

2. If the project you want to relocate is open, use File > Close Project to close the project, but leave TMG open with no project.

 

3. Use File > Copy Project to copy the project to the external drive.

 

4. Use File > Rename Project to change the name of the copy that remains on the computer's hard drive to something that will remind you not to enter data on that computer.

 

5. If there is a copy of the project on the other computer, rename it as well.

 

You should now be able to access the Project from the external drive from whichever computer it's plugged in to.

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Now, if I used a USB HD, would I put the entire TMG on it, or just the data files?

 

TMG (at least TMG 5 or later) usually must be installed on a computer in order to run it. This updates some operating system files as the program and related files are copied to the hard drive. If you just plug in a thumb drive with TMG installed on it, the operating system files on that computer will not be updated appropriately.

 

You may be able to do that with earlier versions of TMG, those that were not designed to run under Windows 95. Although I have not tried that with TMG, I do have Ultimate Family Tree running directly off a thumb drive, so that I can run it from a locked down computer in a research office. But that program was designed for Windows 3.1 and does not know about the features of more "modern" versions of Windows.

 

I have heard of enhanced thumb drives that will allow you to run some modern programs directly from the hard drive, but so far to me they are only rumors, and I don't know if they would work with TMG.

 

It is useful to have backups on more than one computer, and even better if you have a running copy of your data that you put on a second computer from the backup, just to be sure you have a good backup. Better yet, have one of those computers in another part of town/the country so local disasters (house burning down, your neighborhood being flooded) won't destroy all copies of your data.

 

Pierce

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