DevonThink 2.5 - When files jump from one place to another

I have already spoken about this bug acting in a lightly different way here: “With 2.5 version, document deleted = another document moved” => With 2.5 version, document deleted = another document moved

I have created a new databasis with DevonThink 2.5.
I have saved in it DropBox using it in the old way that it is to say without sync and never opening the databasis on two PCs at the same time.
I have opened the databasis on another PC still in DevonThink 2.4.
I have worked a little on it without noticing any problem.
I have saved it in DropBox.

I have opened again the databasis on the PC with DevonThink 2.5.
And now as you can see below the files don’t jump when I open “Informations” in the “Presentation” by “Arborescence”.

But they do jump elsewhere when I open “Informations” in the presentation by “List”.

Before opening “informations”:

After opening “informations”:


Such things never happened in DevonThink 2.4…

As I am using here a databasis created specially to test these bugs, I can send it by mail if you want to study them.

Even it doesn’t seem, that is an important problem for us. We can’t sync in the new way. But we can’t go back to the old way we used when our differents PCs were all in DevonThink 2.4. The 2.4.3 version is not available for download in the legacy versions you propose.

So it’s now for us an everyday problem to work at the team level… :imp:



Malheureux. Le Forum n’est pas un bon endroit pour résoudre ce problème compliqué. Vous recevrez un meilleur service si vous envoyez vos questions à support@devontechnologies.com. Vous pouvez envoyer votre demande en français, si c’est plus facile.

La version actuelle de DEVONthink est 2.5.1. Comme vous le savez, est DEVONthink OSX, et ne fonctionne pas sur “PC”. Stockage bases de données dans Dropbox n’est pas une bonne idée.

S’il vous plaît, excusez ma grammaire.

OK, Thanks Korm.

I will send the topic and the pictures to support@devontechnologies.com.

I used “PCs” to simplify. We have Powerbooks, iMacs and so on… everything under OS X of course.

Dropbox is not a good idea but, with some discipline, we had no problem at all with it until 2.5 (or 2.5.1 if you prefer, installed by us as soon as it was available).

It’s not a matter of “discipline”. Dropbox is not made to sync our databases therefore damage can happen very sporadically. You may get away with it for awhile but not by force of will but by luck alone. We still advise strongly against this procedure.

We were using only dropbox as a data container, opening and closing a file from a Mac before opening and closing another file on another Mac.

In any case, it seems we have now problems to migrate databases used in this way with no apparent problem until DevonThink 2.4.3, to DevonThink 2.5.1 and to launch the sync with the last and right method you provide now.

When I have time, I will try to create another test databasis excluding completely DropBox. If I don’t find again the same apparent bugs, it will mean that our databases are in one way or another corrupted. And we still have a problems since these are professional knowledge databases with thousands of docs…

Franck, like Korm I recommend that you contact DevonTechnologies’ support http://www.devontechnologies.com/contact.html?. As Korm said: this issue is not the kind of issue endusers like us can address.

Apart from reporting the problem you might want to ask them for a copy of 2.4.3, should you need one. However, I don’t think you need one, for as far as I know, DEVONThink 2.4.3 can easily be copied from one computer to another. Uninstall 5.1 before you open 2.4.3 (see ‘DevonThink’s Help → documentation → read me → installing, uninstalling, updating’ for instructions).

The problem you mention seems to result from the interaction between 2.4.3 and 2.5.1. If so it will be solved if you move all your computers to 2.5.1. After that move from dropbox sync to Devon Sync via Dropbox as soon as possible. Look elsewhere in this forum for instructions.

I really think you shouldn’t dropbox sync, but if you do, make sure that you backup frequently. Don’t trust the internal backups of DevonThink (for dropbox might corrupt them too). Regularly copy the databases with the finder or a file sync utility (Time Machine, ChronoSync or whatever) to a place outside Dropbox.

Thanks a lot Arnow for your very complete answer! :smiley:

I will follow your different ideas.
We are going to backup everything out of DropBox first.

Whatever the issue, I will give a feedback.

Glad you like my tips!

Information on how to move from Dropbox sync to DEVON Sync can be found here:

Arnow: Thanks a lot for this post: Syncing and database location/storage

Here is my feedback for all:

I have followed steps by steps Arnow’s very useful advices. They were conflicted copies of the .dtMeta and settings files to delete.
I don’t use any more DropBox.
I have local databases all under DevonThink 2.5.
They sync by the local network.
I have even suppressed corrupted files that were empty and creating problems during syncs.

But tags became somewhere in the process empty files and appeared in most of the bins.
When I try to delete these files, they “jump” simply somewhere else.
Same thing for the other files, try to delete them and they will jump somewhere else.
So the databases are becoming messes out of control…

OK our databases have been corrupted by us using DropBox as a data container, but does it explain why DevonThink 2.5 deplaces files instead of deleting them?

DevonThink Problem.pngLast news!

I have created a completely new databasis in DevonThink 2.5.1.
It has never had nothing to do with DropBox.
I have put in this new databasis only one RSS feed.
I have received immediately some html files by this RSS file.
I have opened one of them in Firefox.
I have clipped this html page in the only one file I have created in the databasis to transform it in a web archive.
I have suppressed the html file since I have now the web archive.
And guess what? Another html file from the RSS feed has jumped outside the RSS feed file!

It’s easy probably easy to recreate.
I would be interested to have some ideas about what happens here.

No, actually, it is not. I’ve tried for an hour and can find no combination of actions or keystrokes to make this happen. And in years of constant use I’ve never seen such a weird response from DEVONthink. :open_mouth:

It is possible that DEVONthink is interacting with some other app, hack, menubar utility, or keyboard shortcut on that machine. Why not shut down DEVONthink, move ~/Library/Preferences/com.devon-technologies.thinkpro2.plist to the Desktop and relaunch DEVONthink. What happens? If nothing changes, you can always put the old plist back where it came from. If the problem goes away, then something was corrupted in the preferences.

Thanks a lot, Korm, for having tried during one hour to reproduce the problem.

It’s true it’s very strange. We have used DevonThink since June 2012 and until DevonThink 2.5 without any problem.

Some clues perhaps:

  • I have found in the bin of a databasis some tags files which had just jumped from another databasis! Yes, directly from a databasis to another!
  • Then I have noticed that the file I supposed had just jumped out of the RSS feed was timed at… yesterday (see the image above, on the right) and I have just created this new databasis… today.
  • I have not found the file ~/Library/Preferences/com.devon-technologies.thinkpro2.plist in (in french on my Macs, bibliothèque = library) ~/bibliothèque/preferences/

At the top of this thread was a suggestion to write support@devontechnologies.com – one-on-one help from Support.

Clearly, this forum is not solving your problem – in fact it is just getting odder :frowning:

OK Korm, Thanks for the help in any case.
I wrote on friday to the support.
I am waiting for them to take the case in charge.

Last news!

We have huge databases with hundreds or thousands of docs behind tens of RSS feeds.
When we delete all the tags of the docs and that we parameter the DevonThink RSS not to import these tags any more, we have less problems of “jumping files”. It seems there is a link, under DevonThink 2.5 only, between lots of RSS feeds, lots of tags (n X 10.000), lots of docs, deleting items with the right mouse button (control click) and jumping files…

After these first experiments, it seems very difficult to keep this kind of databases well organized when using DevonThink sync. If you are interested, have a look on this other post I have just created here: Mirroring and not syncing? Conflict resolution rules?

Until now, I would say that if you have databases with lots of RSS feeds and quite a good amount of docs (begining at n X thousands), perhaps it would be better to wait improvements to come before using DevonThink as a collaborative tool for everyday work.

If we don’t use a solution like Evernote Business for our Knowledge databases, that’s because DevonThink allowed us, until now, to keep them perfectly organized.