It’s hard for me to say whether the problems are due to the current version (4.0.2) or are older – I wanted to take advantage of the new 4 to review all my databases and i noticed that there are problems in almost every major database that even automatic repair, optimization, or rebuild can’t resolve.
Is there also a smart way to collect all the orphaned files? I just don’t want to manually search through hundreds of entries using CTRL-clicks…
The orphans folder contains in some cases a few files but in most cases it’s still empty?
DEVONthink 4 would not generate a bunch of orphaned files. It’s likely your databases were just unhealthy to begin with. Any detected ones are put into an Orphans group in the root of the database.
Also, you should read the Troubleshooting > Repairing a defective database > Orphaned Files section of the built-in Help and manual.
I’m having the same problem. Downloads of several databases from Backblaze are seriously corrupted. One of them shows the Smart Groups and 9000+ files in Orphaned. I tried going to earlier backups in Backblaze and same problem. I tried deleting DT4 and reinstalling DT3 and found the same corrupted files. Repair has not worked. Some of them are databases I haven’t opened lately – no recent activity. One is empty. I managed to pull all the files out of one database to Finder, so salvaged them, but at a loss what to do about the others. This is a major, major problem. I’m trying to stay calm. Making an appointment with Apple to check my computer to make sure it’s not the problem. But nothing else is affected by this – all non-DT files seem to be OK and other apps are functioning.
PS: Some of my databases are OK, suggesting this was an “incident”, not necessarily an ongoing problem? I’ve duplicated them to another location to prevent any further damage so I can keep trying to salvage what I can, but the whole thing is making me very nervous.
PS2: Attempting repair has sometimes caused DT to freeze up – have to Force Quit. Have one database open now (the one with 9000+ files) and it’s attempting “Indexing Items” (I didn’t ask for that), but it’s not making much progress – stuck on one file and expect DT will stop responding soon.
“indexing” in this case is parsing the document content and normal.
If DEVONthink is stalled, do a Spotlight search for Activity Monitor . Go into Activity Monitor and select our application in the list of processes - it should show “(Not Responding)” and the name in red - and press Command-Option-S to run a sample on it. When the sample window opens, press the Save button and save it to your Desktop. Please attach this text file to a support ticket so we can inspect it. Thanks!
My DT files are, and always have been, on my internal drive, always in the same location. I have never used indexing. Everything on my computer is automatically saved to Backblaze on a continuous basis. Every evening I back up my computer to Time Machine – lately to a relatively new Seagate external hard drive, which failed a few days ago. My databases have never been on iCloud – until that drive failed, then I dragged them there out of desperation (and never opened them).
I managed to download backups of the 3 corrupted DT databases from Backblaze – they weren’t quite right, but I could see the files inside and copied all of them into a new folder in Finder. (Whew!)
Still don’t understand what happened. Apple said they checked my laptop (a relatively new MacBookPro with Sequoia updated) and found no problems, but recommended I wipe it clean and reinstall OS and all apps. The Seagate has a data recovery warranty, so will pursue that.
I’m left with some doubts about DT4, which makes me sad because I rely on it all the time. Might go back to DT3 for a while. And to be on the safe side, will probably create a new database and Index everything I pulled out of those corrupted files.
I am kinda wondering about the BackBlaze backups. Might have been incomplete or corrupted on the way up or down. Did you have DEVONthink archive backups in zip format backed up? Perhaps a more reliable backup (at least that’s the backup format I rely on)?
Automatic backups of not closed databases are the most likely reason. If DEVONthink modifies some of the internal database files at the same time the backup might be inconsistent, incomplete and/or corrupted.
It has been discussed very often (including in the documentation - Getting Started > A Word About Backups), you shouldn’t use a continuous, or real-time backup. You should use a scheduled snapshot-style backup similar to what Time Machine uses.
It also looks like the only scheduled backups they now support are once a day (which should actually be sufficient in many cases)…
It depends on your perspective. If this was my only backup (which we don’t recommend only having one), personally would either just use a scheduled backup or another app.
I think the section in the DEVONthink Manual “A WORD ABOUT BACKUPS” covers it well.
Without describing my entire backup regime I do exclude DEVONthink databases (all in ~/Documents/DEVONthink/) from BackBlaze, but do include the backup archives (~/Backups/DEVONthink) that are in zip format and created automatically on a schedule.
And TimeMachine in operation for everything and running all the time to a NAS and USB drive.
the TimeMachine would be a last resort in case you just have to restore the entire drive, correct (with fully functional DT databases) - is that correct? I mean, would it be good to just restore 1 database from TimeMachine?
the TimeMachine would be a last resort in case you just have to restore the entire drive, correct (with fully functional DT databases) - is that correct? I mean, would it be good to just restore 1 database from TimeMachine?
No that’s not correct. Unlike the iOS backups, Time Machine has long had a granular interface to restore files, as needed.
