I tried the official Opus support ticket site for the third time and guess what... it actually worked this time
Just in case, I also wanted to put it out in the open to see if anyone has any ideas about my two backup suggestions.
1: Backup File Name always reverts to the same name with current date.
I want it to remember the last name I gave a backup as I use a visual description such as Brown... Animals - African - Opus Config - 29-Apr-2008 (01) for my backups. This way if I ever have to reinstall Opus or simply want to revert to an earlier setup, I can find it by the backup name and sequence number for any single day.
As you can see, I often make several backups in the same day when I am making a lot of changes and having the (01) or (02) etc. helps me to keep track of the sequence of changes made that day. Currently the b[/b] (along with my other custom applied name such as Brown... Animals - African) disappears each time I do a backup and I have to look at the actual D:\Configs and Settings\Directory Opus folder to see where I am at in the naming and number sequence.
Most backup utilities that I have ever used allow me to do this as they almost always remember the last name used; this is very helpful for me and simply makes sense in any backup utility.
2: Save a description with the backup file does not seem to do anything.
The description is nowhere to be found after it is entered and the backup is made.
The part with automatically appended numbers sounds useful, since i´m also making several "snapshots" between changes on one day quite often. The other idea could be made as an extra checkbox "save backups under custom name" or so. On the other hand, it´s no big deal just to overwrite the date, since it´s already highlighted. You only have to start typing.
Another very small enhancement imo would be, if the first checkbox ("save") would be already checked by default. In case one of the other options were wanted, you could check them by using the arrow keys.
FWIW... here's some of the code in my Backup & Restore button:
Clipboard SET my dopus settings new
Recent CLEAR
Prefs BACKUPRESTORE
The first command should be self explanatory and copies the string 'my dopus settings new' to the clipboard for easy Ctrl+V pasting into the backup dialog... NOT the same as what you've asked for inosfar as Opus 'remembering' the previous name, but perhaps useful until/if changes are made.
The thing about auto-selecting the 'Backup Configuration' radial box is a good idea... Perhaps GPSoft can say if the value in the /dopuslocaldata\backupconfig.osd file can be modified (or you can 'hack' test) so that the 'Backup Configuration' option is pre-selected when opening the dialog. I did a similar thing with the in order to get Opus to always pre-selecxt the 'Replace existing configuration completely' option after selecting 'Restore Configuration'.
The thing about the backup file 'Description'... dunno about that one . Seems like an 'idea' that never got fully implemented as far as the Opus interface is concerned. What it DOES do, is to add the text you've typed in as a 'ZIP Comment'. So while it's not visible in the Opus interface... it IS visble in various ZIP utilities equivilant of 'Show ZIP Comment' option.
I think this last part is actually pretty funny when you think about it... One of Opus selling points is eliminating the need for other archive utilities (at least for the most popular archive formats). I'm assuming the Backup 'description' is written through some provision in the Dyna-Zip library Opus uses, but it does NOT seem to contain a facility for viewing the ZIP comment even though it's producing files with this info in them .
It seems a generally good idea for an additional feature request:
I just ran into another MAJOR problem with the Backup / Restore utilitie.
I created another Forum thread about a problem of losing my toolbars.
I could not get to any of the commands in Opus so I thought that I would do what I have done with many other backup / restore utilities; that is, to simply double-click on the last backup that I had made just a few hours before. To my surprise, double-clicking on the Brown... Animals - African - Opus Config - 29-Apr-2008 (02).ocb it did not load the restore app as expected.
This needs to be fixed as it is much faster to restore a messed up Opus with the Restore function than having to un-install than re-install Opus as I had to.
If you have somehow removed all your toolbars you can still get to Customize to turn them on, or Preferences to run the Backup/Restore tool, from the window menu of any Lister (left-click on the lightbulb icon in the top-left.)
Not sure how that could possibly have happened. There's no option to turn that off
Just to clarify, I'm talking about this icon here:
If somehow that is missing (and I've never seen this in ANY windows program, let alone in Opus), you should also be able to bring up the menu with a right-click to the title bar.
(I've deleted the other thread as it only consisted of duplicates of posts in this thread, but with fewer replies, so either we have to post everything in two places or people will find one thread and think that nobody answered all the questions...
In future, please do create new threads for unrelated issues, but please don't post the same information in two threads. At most just post a link to the other thread if you think it will be useful to people who find the first one.)
THAT light bulb; sorry I thought it was just the Opus logo icon.
I had right and left clicked on it several times as the top left corner icon is often a way out of trouble but in this case it only brought up three choices
Restore, Minimize and Close.
The other choices were greyed out.
I tried Single, Double, Shift, Alt and Ctrl-click.
[quote](I've deleted the other thread as it only consisted of duplicates of posts in this thread, but with fewer replies, so either we have to post everything in two places or people will find one thread and think that nobody answered all the questions...
In future, please do create new threads for unrelated issues, but please don't post the same information in two threads. At most just post a link to the other thread if you think it will be useful to people who find the first one.)[/quote]
The two threads were created for two entirely different subjects, this one for Backup / Restore problems and the other one for the missing toolbar.
What happen was that Jon picked up on the missing toolbar problem on this thread as the reason that I had problems with the Restore utility. I simply answered Jons suggestions on this thread and thought to also keep the other thread on the missing toolbar updated.
I would, of course, have deleted the other thread as the subject matters had inadvertently merged into one.
The real problem is the originator of a thread can not delete (or for that matter edit) his own thread; I don not understand why we are so restricted in this area.
Any chance of this policy being reviewed and changed
Doc, both of your posts in the other thread (including, crucially, the initial post of the new thread) were duplicated in this thread. I guess Jon saw the question in here first so he responded in here. Since there was more information (i.e. Jon's answers) in here, and the duplicate posts kept coming, I decided to delete the other thread and what was in here.
At some later point (if I remember) I might split this sub-thread into a thread of its own, so that everything is neatly arranged, but I decided not to do that now as it might confuse people following the thread while it's active
I'm not being "hard" I'm just removing duplicate stuff from the forum so that when people search for things they don't have to sift through duplicate messages and threads with no extra info.
We're not going to relax the editing rules. We tried doing so twice and in both cases it immediately caused problems and had to be undone, as decribed in the FAQ on editing. We know it's annoying but it's less annoying than the alternative, so it's not going to change. If you need something editing just alert an admin.
Additionally, this is a good example of where user-editing or deleting of posts would cause a problem. If you edited your post after Jon had posted his reply then Jon's reply would no longer make any sense to anyone.
As I said, I would have deleted it myself as I saw it was turning into a duplicate.
Oh well, no harm done.
You are a good taskmaster, Leo; a little hard, but a good taskmaster never the less.
Thanks for deleting it for me.
As far as the editing rules are concerned, I may start another thread with a bunch of suggestions as I think there may be a better way. But, that is for a latter time and place.
I just noticed another weird thing about the Restore function of the Backup utility; that is my registration information was not restored even though I told it to restore all items.
This may be an intentional omission from the Restore function but can not see why.
[quote="DocLotus"]...my registration information was not restored even though I told it to restore all items.
Any chance it can be corrected in a future build [/quote]
Nothing is 'broken' so it's not needing any 'correction' . Backup and Restore simply doesn't backup 'registration' info... just 'setting and config' info. This is by design and something I doubt GPsoft will 'change' as a result of a feature request with licensing info being as sensitive as it is...
Side Note: regarding editing posts etc etc. Unfortunately, not 'everyone' can be counted on to use the editing force wisely. So while you might have a clear idea of how to responsibly 'use the power'... as with many things it's often a minority of others who impact the masses... 'nuff said.