1__#$!@%!#__spacer.gif in all RTFD docs?

DEVONthink Tips
1

I’m using a debase with over 50k RTFD “docs” and noticed some sluggish performance when copying to a flash drive the other day. After investigating various avenues, it occurs to me that the issue could have been numerous small files being copied. A little investigation led me to the rtfd packages. I’ve never looked inside one, and I was surprised to find spacer-type gifs in each one (that I checked). 3 in total:

1__#$!@%!#__spacer.gif
send.php.gif
spacer.gif

Are any of these gifs actually necessary? I plan to be doing a lot of copying back and forth between flash drives, and if I can delete even one of the three it will be a great help.

EDIT: After thinking on this some more, it occurs to me that all of the RTFD’s are converted HTML pages. I’m guessing the GIFs are leftover from the conversion and wholly unnecessary now. I’m going to delete them en masse (after backing up, of course) and see what happens.

2

If you convert an RTFD to a “Formatted Note” and then convert the “Formatted Note” to “Rich Text” you’ll get an RTF – i.e., the images are gone from the RTFD package.

Doing this for 50,000 documents would be exhaustive, but just thought I’d mention it. Test and verify.

3

RTF(D) files are package files that include the document’s text and graphic elements.

If you delete any element inside the package file, it will no longer be available.

Thumb drives typically are not very fast, although some are much faster than others. And they tend not to be as reliable as conventional hard drives, especially if they are rewritten often.

I sometimes use a thumb drive to carry a collection of pictures or audio files.

But not for heavy duty work. For example, to copy a 4.8 GB DEVONthink Pro Office database to a Kingston 32 GB thumb drive takes over 12 minutes. To copy the same file to a USB 3 portable drive takes about a minute.

4

Thanks for the responses, especially the convert-to-RTF.

As for the thumb drive, it’s not the speed so much as their inherent weakness concerning multiple small files. A flash drive and external HDD can be equally fast copying a single large file. Copy thousands of small ones, however, and the flash drive will always crumble.