I have the same database (Spence) open on my Mac laptop and Mac desktop. As you can see they are different. They both report that they sync, verify and check integrity perfectly but clearly they are not. There is only one spence.dtcloud file on my server. I have run out of ideas on solving this. Please can you help?
Thanks
Did you create the database on each Mac, being careful to name them the same?
Thanks for your quick reply. Yes I did, one on each Spence.dtBase2 both of which sync with Spence.dtCloud
Is this part of the mystery? Spence.dtcloud is not a database, it’s a sync store which can contain many synced databases including multiple spence.dtBase2 databases.
I tested this by creating a new sync store and syncing two different databases, each named demo.
Devonthink apparently identifies databases in a sync store by UUID, not name.
Note to @BLUEFROG — I am not trying to snatch the pebble from your hand. That never goes well. This is merely a humble student honoring the masters. 
There is nothing wrong here and it’s operating as expected.
Two databases with the same name are no more the same database than two people named John Smith are the same person. And @Amontillado is correct about the UUID. So you can make 100 Spence databases and none will ever sync with each other because the UUID is different for each.
The proper (and documented) thing to do is to import the database from the sync location. This creates a true copy of a database and is mentioned in the In & Out > Sync Explained > Common Questions section of the built-in Help and manual.
Ok thanks both. I’ve never had this happen before in many years. How might I identify the smaller database to delete it and point the laptop to the bigger one please? Is the UUID in the files somewhere? There are two MANIFEST files in Spence.dtCloud, do I delete or rename the smaller one of these? The odd thing is they have been exactly the same for years. I have no idea how this came about because I only use one sync store for each of my databases.
Don’t delete anything in a dtsync package. Go into Devonthink’s preferences and use the Clean Database feature in the cog button to delete synced databases from the sync store.
right ok thanks. I was going to do this but a message said my database would be overwritten. I assumed this meant the dtCloud would be overwritten by the dtBase2
Cleaning a database from a sync store removes it from the sync store without touching your local version.
How about this. Backup everything first. You probably won’t need backups unless you don’t have them.
Close your spence database(s) on one of your machines. Go into the Devonthink settings and import them into a new, empty, folder on your mac. As you import additional spence databases, use a different name for each, spence1, spence2, or something like that.
Decide on one spence database as your real one. Go into the duplicate databases and move everything you care about into your main spence database.
Clean your database store of all spences.
Sync your main spence to your database store.
Right click on the duplicate spences in Devonthink’s sidebar and delete them.
That should consolidate them.
excellent advice thank you. much appreciated
A little more info, from the docs:
Cleaning: If the verification fails, you can then clean the sync location or database to remove the sync data in that location. The results of the clean will be reported in the Log window. After a successful clean, you can upload the database(s) again. And just to ease anyones’ mind, cleaning a sync location has no effect on the local databases on your devices. Sync data is not your database and is separate from the local databases on your devices, Mac and mobile.
Thanks Amontillado that worked. I am very grateful
Just FYI. my problem was not due to DT. I use Automounter to connect servers on my Macs. It appears that for some reason Automounter had not updated its cache in the laptop’s Library and was using an old version of my DT databases server folder! I have deleted it and remounted my server folder, resynced now everything is hunky dory.
Yet another thing to watch out for…
