I find that if I slide a file from within Parallels to a DTP folder, the copying doesn’t work properly. Oddly, if I try to repeat the move, I get a query from Parallels about whether I want to replace the file that’s already there (in the DTP folder). However, I don’t see the file there; nor does it show up in a search; nor does moving back and forth between open data bases work. The good news is that the file DOES show up if I quit DTP and reopen it. Still, there is a problem.
Configuration: Parallels 5 using Windows XP. Up-to-date DTP. Up-to-date Snow Leopard.
I should have said “to a DTP Group” Left window is Parallels with Windows XP. Right window is a DevonThink database, one with a bunch of groups and subgroups. A standard Parallels functionaity is that one can merely drag a file from it to, say, the Mac desktop. I tried dragging instead to a DTP group and had the result I described: it apparently worked, but there was no icon to indicate that until I quit DTP and restarted.
Suggestion: Try Tools > Show Groups & Tags to display a floating panel, and drag the item from Parallels into a group in that panel. Does that work better?
Double-click the group in the floating panel into which you dragged a file, to open that group in a view window. Is the new item visible?
I use VMware Fusion, but this technique I use there should work the same with Parallels:
Put a link on the Windows XP desktop (or anywhere in Windows) to a shared Mac folder that is physically outside the VM image. Index that folder in DTP. Do your drag/copy to the linked folder. Synchronize on the DTP side.
Does the document show up correctly in DTP? Does it show up in Finder?
Korm, This trick works in Parallels also, as you predicted. Thanks. Since I use multiple databases, I put the folder in my global inbox, calling it From Parallels via Share with DTP. The folder Share with DTP is on my Mac desktop. I can slide stuff from Parallels to that, shift to DTP, synchronize, and voila.
(Bill, “DTP is not Finder,” but what I was trying might reasonably be expected to work. Further, the sliding actually does work; it’s just that the result is not visible in DTP without reopening DTP. As for using the Tools and Groups palette, the palette seems to be visible only when DTP is the active window. Thus, I can’t slide from Parallels to the palette. Or so it seems.)
Actually, if the Groups & Tags panel is open, DT Pro Office does not need to be the frontmost application. Files or folders may be dragged into the floating panel from the Finder, or clippings of selected text/images from other OS X applications such as Safari, Preview, etc. This is a convent way to drag new content into any group in any open database. The keyboard shortcut to open the panel is “Option-Command-G”.
I don’t use Parallels, and was curious as to whether Groups & Tags might be available in the virtualized Windows environment. It seems not.
Bill, the Groups & Tags panel has a preference which determines whether it hangs around or vanishes when DTP isn’t the main window. I changed my preference so that it would hang around and retried the experiment. No luck. Some kind of transfer occurs because the file shows up in a Spotlight search as being in the deep bowels of DTP (Library/Caches/Metadata…). However, it is not visible in DTP and doesn’t show up in a DTP search. I also tried moving the file into Sorter and got “Can’t retrieve selection from Parallels Desktop.”
As mentioned in my earlier response, the method Korm suggested does work.
Thus, there is a workaround, but it’s a shame that the straightforward procedure (just dragging from Parllels desktop into a DTP Group) does not yet work.