INTERACT FORUM

More => Old Versions => Media Center 12 (Development Ended) => Topic started by: JONCAT on January 04, 2007, 01:27:43 pm

Title: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: JONCAT on January 04, 2007, 01:27:43 pm
Love this feature but currently it is not usuable for me. If I want to work on the laptop while my wife watches videos, great, I can access the database no problem.

However, switching between Read Only and Admin removes every single thumbnail. For Video thumbs this is a huge problem as it takes all my 3gHz cpu to restore 400GB of Video thumbs.

Needless to say, this makes this feature unusable as I need to work on editing the library but not at the expense of waiting for thumbs while MC12 can't playback any files due to the 100% crunching cpu.

I use FFDSHOW and I will try turning it off while rebuilding thumbs to see if this increase reload time, but still, this REALLY needs to be addressed.

Is there any way to toggle off the READ ONLY mode? I don't need this protection; isn't that what Party Mode is for anyways?

v/r
Jonathan
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: glynor on January 04, 2007, 02:45:03 pm
The Read Only mode for the database sharing feature isn't to protect your database from you messing it up, it's to protect it from getting corrupted by multiple read/writes at the same time by different machines.  This can happen (I've had it happen when I manually shared my library way back with v10 before I saw the light and designed my own scheme).

So, you do need it.

There is probably a way to fix the Thumbnail problem.  I haven't ever used the new sharing feature, because it's still awfully clunky and not as flexible as the system I use.  Perhaps you should explain the issue more thoroughly (especially the exact steps that cause the thumbs to disappear) in much more detail!
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: JONCAT on January 04, 2007, 03:23:06 pm
Not much more to say.

Exchanging access modes removes thumbs; simple as that. Master account becomes read, thumbnails bye bye.

I still don't believe I NEED this safety feature. I can make sure I am not tagging on two PCs at once, or simply close MC on one machine.

Could you explain or link to your system in more detail : )

DC
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: Alex B on January 04, 2007, 03:39:20 pm
You cannot prevent MC from writing library data. The more or less static library fields are only a part of the database. For example, the Playing Now list changes all the time, each view change writes data and statistics are constantly updated.

When MC detects that a library is reserved it creates a temporary local copy of the library and uses this as a separate library. Actually, some time ago I was positively surprised that MC12 didn't wipe the thumbnails when it was switched from the read only library to the regular library, but I have not recently tried this.
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: Matt on January 04, 2007, 05:04:04 pm
Thumbnails should not be wiped.

Make sure you aren't trying to redirect thumbnails using a reg-hack.  Also, try switching the thumbnail exit behavior in options.

Finally, make sure the two databases you're switching between don't somehow have the same ID. (so they'd try to share the thumbnail directory)
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: JONCAT on January 04, 2007, 07:31:14 pm
No reg-hacks but the IDs are similar; I take it you mean the "name" of the shared database on each PC. The names are share & Shared.

I'll check the exit behavior.

One thing thing I did forget to mention is that in setting up the db I had to put the master PC database in a new location outside of Application Data because the laptop wasn't getting access to that folder even though the entire C: drive on the master account is a shared & mapped network drive. So I moved the Library folder out to C:\Media Center 12\Library.

I never moved the Thumbnails but I just cut & pasted the Thumbs folder to the new location and re-opened MC. Thumbs are gone and MC is still creating a Thumbnails folder at the default location in Application Data Will having a Thumbnail folder, now in the new database, solve the problem or do I have to reconcile this failure to share the "true" Thumbnail folder with the laptop? I'll give it a shot and see what I can do.

DC
Title: Re: Shared Database feature unusable...
Post by: JONCAT on January 06, 2007, 09:06:29 am
Matt,

I set the exit behavior on both PCs to "Leave" as opposed to Erase. Still getting the same behavior.

As I said earlier, I can't access the Documents & Setting\Application Data\J River\MC12 folder to share the database due to access restrictions. Maybe there is a way around this but so far I can' figure it out, and I think they are trying to access the same thumbnail folder even though my new location (outside of app Data) has its own thumbnail folder.

I am confused if there is supposed to be a local thumnbail folder each PC even though they share the database at one location...

thanks for your help so far
Jon