Dear BJ, Many thanks , as always your replies to my questions are concise and answer the point. Kind Regards, Mike. -----Original Message----- From: ftm-tech-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:ftm-tech-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of BJ via Sent: 17 May 2015 16:11 To: ftm-tech@rootsweb.com Subject: Re: [FTM-TECH] Start - Up Fault I'm not sure what the differences are between the regular compact and the deep compact. Here is what I surmise. The data base consists of multiple tables or sections of like data. The most commonly used or modified tables are the individual personal information, the individual facts data, the relationship pointers, the source and source citation data, place information, media data and notes. As this is the data which is most often modified and used, it is the data which is most susceptible to being corrupted or not updated. The "compact" probably examines this information and attempts to correct any problems found. What many of use don't remember or perhaps even recognize is there are other tables in the data base such as the saved reports/chars, the book, calendars, timelines, tasks, etc. These tend to not being used as often and therefore they are as susceptible to being corrupted BUT it is possible. Therefore the developers have provided the Deep Compact which looks at all tables and indices or address tables. Since it is looking at all of the tables and their information, it takes longer to complete. Since it looks at all of the data, it has the potential of not only correcting issues but if interrupted causing some irreparable damage to the data base. Therefore the developers don't tell the user community about it. I suspect your file had a problem with these "extra" tables and therefore the Compact did not correct but the Deep Compact did correct. Here is a list of actions I normally attempt in the order I attempt them. 1. Compact the file - This normally corrects the data addresses (the entries which point to the various tables. 2. Deep Compact the file - This examines all tables and addresses within the data base. 3. Restore from a good backup. This lets the user recover most of the data and retain the links between the data base and the online Ancestry Member Tree (AMT). Dependent upon the frequency of the backups, this may require some reentry of data or reediting of data. 4. Creating a new data base with a single individual and then merging the old data base into the new data base. This technique retains all information by starting with a new non-corrupted data base and simply transferring all data into it. Unfortunately, the new data base is not linked to the AMT so the user must delete the old AMT and then reupload the new data base to a new AMT. 5. I one instance, my data base was so corrupted that I could not use steps 1, 2 or 4. Also I did not have a current backup of my file so I while I could use step 3, it would entail a lot of data reentry which I could probably not remember all of it. In this case, my only opportunity was to download the AMT into a new data base. In this instance, it was my best opportunity but it also entails extensive editing to get the data base back to my original structure. Items which needed to be reviewed and reedited were: * Place names - all needed to be resolved. * Source-Citations - in many instances, I use a single source-citation to document multiple facts for a single person and also a single source-citation to document facts for multiple individuals. The downloaded AMT restores the links between a single source-citation and multiple facts for a single individual only. Therefore I had to re-aggregate multiple individuals to a single source-citation. While it is not too difficult it is time consuming to merge the duplicate source-citations into a single source-citation. * Media items - I save media files with file names which identify the type of media item and to whom it pertains. The downloaded media files lose this information so I have to rename the media files. As I recall, FTM will use the media Caption as the file name. If the media item does not have a Caption, FTM assigns a more generic name. It has been some time since I looked at this but I think FTM will use the individual's name as part of the generated file name. Also for those media items automatically downloaded from the Ancestry Online Data Bases such as the Census images, the Caption may not be what you had in your original data. The media Description, Image categories, Notes, etc. are lost and will have to be reentered. I don't use source templates but I suspect, those source-citations where templates were used will have to be converted to the template again. Perhaps some one who uses templates can correct me if they are retained. I hope this answers your question. BJ On 5/17/2015 4:59 AM, Mike Thacker wrote: > Dear BJ, > As always when I submit a question to the forum I get an answer to > my problem and also thanks to all that replied, I did as you suggested > BJ and did "deep compacting of the file" this so far seems to have > cured the start - up problem. Is it possible that you could explain > how and why the deep compact works and the ordinary compact does not? > (in laymen's terms > please) as I am not a programmer. > Once again may thanks to the forum and members for all the help > given. ********************************** List information page http://lists.rootsweb.com/index/other/Software/FTM-TECH.html ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to FTM-TECH-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message