Duplicate files not showing as duplicates

DEVONthink Tips
1

On occasion I get files which I know are duplicates, everything is identical, but DEVONthink does not colour/flag them as duplicates on my installation.

However, on a colleagues installation these duplicates show up fine as duplicates (blue).

Even after syncing, the duplicate files always show correctly as duplicates on his installation, but not on mine.

I should add that I still do get many duplicates being correctly flagged - just not all of them, or the same as what he gets.

One other difference between our installations;
Toggling the “See Also & Classify” hat opens the side bar while narrowing the main window, and then closing the side bar and widening the main window back to the original size.

On his installation it does this ok, on mine the main window stays at the narrower size.

Any ideas?

2

DEVONthink occasional reports things as being duplicates when they are not, and not being duplicates when they are. It can be useful for Support to see actual examples of documents where DEVONthink doesn’t behave as expected. If you open a ticket at that link you can upload some samples. (I wouldn’t post them here in a public forum.)

3

If this were April 1, I might give directions for building a gremlin trap.

Errors can accumulate in a computer. They can originate by sheer chance, or a bit can be twiddled as a cosmic ray zips through a chip. A cache file can be corrupted. A software hack installed on the computer may change code in OS X with unfortunate consequences.

When unexpected things happen, the first thing to try is a Restart. That clears the computer’s memory and freshly reloads the operating system, applications and data files. It’s one of the things Jim and I often suggest when we receive a Support ticket describing abnormal behavior by DEVONthink. And that suggestion was the answer for many cases. :slight_smile:

Generally when I recommend trying a Restart, I recommend that first, DEVONthink’s cache be cleared as well (Application Name > Empty Cache, in the menubar).

I follow a routine of preventive maintenance of my Mac and its operating system. Once in a while I run Disk Utility’s Verify Disk procedure. Yes, my MacBook Pro Retina with a 500 GB SSD has developed disk errors several times, and my checks have allowed repair before serious problems developed. If you run this routine every few weeks and never find an error, your time has not been wasted.

Every two or three weeks, and immediately if I see flaky behavior, I run an OS X maintenance utility. I use C0cktail; the free OnyX application is similar. I run a suite of procedures such as permissions check, cache cleaning, etc. These procedures are available in Apple’s Terminal application, but the utility apps make them user-friendly.

I try to avoid installing utilities that change features or functions of OS X, especially those that actually modify code in OS X. Some of those utilities promise time-saving and convenience, and I sacrifice those advantages by not using them. Perhaps I’m a nut about this. But my operating system tends to stay clean and efficient, and I rarely see problems on my Macs. I periodically run Tools > Verify & Repair on my DEVONthink Pro Office databases, and haven’t seen an error for a very long time.

If flaky behavior persists after Restart, Disk Utility checks and running an OS X maintenance utility, a hack installed on the computer may be the source of problems. This can be checked by running DEVONthink in a Guest account.

Once in a while DEVONthink, a complex application that has many procedures, develops a bug, or a call made to OS X hits a bug in OS X. Send in a ticket to Support if you find a bug in OS X. We want to know, so bugs can be fixed.

4

Thanks for the response Bill.

I actually do the same thing - run disk utility every couple of weeks. Also /sbin/fsck -fy at startup. Every now and then it does find errors, and these are usually DEVONthink related - incorrect block count or something like that.

I do religiously run verify and try to keep my system running in good nick. Been months since I saw an orphaned file or Verification error.

Having said that, my main database is over 13GB so the potential for glitches is larger, and I know multiple smaller databases would be recommended. But at this stage I need the database as it is for various reasons.

Even so, after clearing caches, verifying, running disk utility from a separate startup, the behaviour is just the same - both in the See Also window, and the not flagging of some duplicates.

It is not a critical issue - just wondered if it was known, and there was an easy solution like resetting a preference file etc.

I assume there would be no point in submitting the duplicate files - as they correctly show up on the other system.

I don’t use any utilities other than what comes with OS X, but will try out Cocktail, and also the guest user suggestion.

5

Thingy, aka C0cktail. :slight_smile: