possible bug dragging sections in tree

[0ad]

hi

this is in v9, content tree - we've had sections disappear when dragging them up and down the tree order.

anyone else had this? anyone know if this has been addresses in an update - it doesnt seem to happen all the time - so far just twice - enough to set us back a couple of days on a rollback!

regards

0

[leehack]

You are not alone, it's been raised and mentioned a few times already over the past few months. A search should yield a few threads if you want to see what has been said on the subject.

Are you using 903? 904 is due out reasonably soon, you should be ok after that (we hope).

Start snapshotting before you move things and just after, protect your time better. And check the snapshots have actually worked by making sure they are not 0 bytes in size.

[0ad]

cheers leehack

i think we're on 903.

i did search it before posting honest - but probably used the wrong search terms.

regards

[grantglendinnin]

I think everybody vented their frustrations in the one thread - pasting sections slow.

[leehack]

You're not missing much as I recall, more a discussion about it than any solutions posted. You just need to tread carefully for the time being. There has been a fix mentioned for slowness of moving sections, not sure if that would help at all, I expect not, maybe worth a try if you feeling brave.

[Orchid]

We just had this today as well - but as we're an enterprise customer we can't do a snapshot (snapshots don't work in Enterprise yet).

We can do database backups - but these are quite techy to setup and I wouldn't want a content processor anywhere near them just to move a section. So this is a dangerous bug for us.

We are rather miffed to be honest - we're supposed to be on the premier product yet we have less functionality than the folks on the standard multi-user.

(enterprise is faster, though so it's not all bad news)

[LouPhi]

This has just happened to me - but we've lost MASSES of information. We have a backup from last Friday, but have made alot of changes since then.

Is there anyway I can open the backup, copy the sections that have been deleted, and then reinstall them into todays copy (ie, keeping all the layout, new products etc)

I've got a feeling that if I go into the .mdb file and copy the sections this might work - but can anyone confirm or otherwise that this is the case?

I can't believe this problem dates back to AT LEAST last April, but Actinic haven't found a fix for it yet. We've potentially lost our best-selling products, and best case scenario - will have to repeat the last 5 days work (which is significant).

[chris ashdown]

If you have a multi site actinic you could make a new site xxxnew and import the old snapshot into that, then open the new site cut the section, change sites to the original xxx and paste into folder

Jan has a free MBD backup software you might find handy do backups on demand

[leehack]

Perhaps you need to have a read up on snapshots before you continue any further, completing 5 days work without taking a single snapshot is a crazy idea which can only ever end in tears.

There's a tutorial on my site, will take you 10 mins to read, could have saved you 5 days work in this case, have a good read and start protecting yourself a little better, time is valuable, nothing more frustrating than redoing work you've already done.

[LouPhi]

Thanks - we don't have multi-site unfortunately so thats not an option, but thanks for the tip.

As for reading up on snapshots and the benefits of taking them regularly, this is stating the obvious. Its patronising and not particularly helpful, albeit a very good point.

At the end of the day this is a major Actinic bug, and it should be fixed. I'll raise it with Actinic but my confidence in their responses dwindled the last time they took 3 days to tell me something I already knew and which didn't fix the problem.

Does anybody think my original suggestion would work (ie, opening the database and copying the products table from our last backup into todays version)???

[guccij]

this is stating the obvious

So obvious, but you didn't do it

[guccij]

Does anybody think my original suggestion would work (ie, opening the database and copying the products table from our last backup into todays version)???

It could work. But the chances are you'll corrupt the mdb.

[leehack]

this is stating the obvious.

Absolutely. One certainly hopes it's an obvious point for people to do nowadays, as with any other valuable data. Good luck anyway.

[LouPhi]

Unfortunately my customer didn't take backups when he was making changes, but its a lesson learned. I really do appreciate your helpful comments, but its frustrating to be spoken to like a 5 year old when its already evident to us we've effed up!

I've figured out a solution... installed the backup from Friday, exported the 'products' to a .csv file. Imported the backup from this morning (with all the missing sections) and then import the .csv products file - I imagine we'll have lots of duplicates, but I'd rather be deleting doubles than having to recreate missing products/sections from scratch.

[taliesyn]

Jan has a free MBD backup software you might find handy do backups on demand

We have had this problem more than once (even after the SQL fix), and Mole-End's free MDB backup software has saved our bacon more than once. Thanks Jan, I think Mole-End actually deserve a medal!

To be honest, this problem was the final straw with us and is why we didn't renew our cover last time round. Also I have never had a problem involving us sending a snapshot in that I haven't fixed myself one way or another before they managed to get back to me (or before I got irate, chased them up, and they told me they couldn't help). So all in all, we're pretty disillusioned with cover

I spent long hours evaluating products when the renewal came up and I very nearly moved systems, but having used Actinic it since v6, I thought it was 'better the devil you know' for the moment.

One thing it has done is make me improve my backup strategies in general, so it's not all bad news I guess