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Author Topic: Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?  (Read 16303 times)

Schewe

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #60 on: July 15, 2010, 03:40:42 am »

Quote from: John R Smith
Just being pedantic, I think it was shrinking "violet", rather than rose. But the "rosebud" bit was rather good  


Yeah, I think you are right...the phrase is indeed "shrinking violet"...got that wrong (not so much wrong on the difficulty of the code though). Glad you liked the Rose Bud...(we actually have a Rosebud restaurant here in Chicago-never been yet).
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Per Zangenberg

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #61 on: July 15, 2010, 05:33:33 am »

Quote from: semillerimages
I do have a clue, but you obviously don't. It's too bad because with a positive attitude and a friendly way of doling out information people might actually respect you. If you had half a clue about how most respectful people treated each other you would know that.

(that's not a joke, bud...)

This may be relevant...
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Craig Arnold

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #62 on: July 15, 2010, 07:37:27 am »

Quote from: Schewe
Uh huh...so, what apps have YOU created?

What exactly have YOU done that might be pointed at as indicative of proving that setting the backup from launch to save is more that 15 minutes of code work?

Sorry, don't know you from Adam...I know the Lightroom engineers, and respect them...don't know your creds bud...care to share? (and have you ever coded anything in Lua using MySQL?)

Since you are such an expert, care to share exactly how the Lightroom engineers screwed up? Lota people talk...not many ship products. What had YOU done lately?

I know that argumentum ad hominem is your default mode of arguing, but you do realise that whether I have shipped any apps or not has about as much relevance as whether you have a beard or not?

Attacking the arguer rather than the argument is a useful debating tactic because it throws off the debater, but it has nothing to do with whether either party is talking sense or not.

To satisfy your curiousity however: As it happens my team is releasing a new version of our stockbroking application this evening. I have worked in banking and finance application development for the last 15 years. You wouldn't have heard of any of our systems as they are not the kind of thing that the general public has any use for. But we do have to be quite careful and know at least a little bit about software development because millions of dollars pass through our systems every day and mistakes can be costly. I have experience with a variety of database systems, ISAM-based (like SQLite), relational (like MySQL), and object-based (like Cache). I have never used Lua for anything serious, though I have written a few World-of-Warcraft add-ons with it.

You have made a few points which show actually that YOU don't have much of a clue about software development, you don't get much credibility by just knowing someone who does. I know a bunch of people who can do cool things, but that doesn't mean I can comment on them with any authority or coming off as out of my depth.

"The coding behind performing a database backup needs to be radically different depending on whether the process is run at the start or the end of the application." This is nonsense. The code needs to ensure that all database access has ceased - this is easier to establish at the start rather than at the end, which is presumably why it was put there in the first place, but once the work has been done to make it robust enough to run at the end after all connections have been closed and the writes flushed, the EXACT same code can be called at the start - if it can't then it's bad coding. Been there done that, many times.

The only alarming thing is the implication that LR 1&2 were allowing the application to close before a clean shutdown of the database had been performed in the first place. BTW LR doesn't use MySql, it uses SQLite which is a very different kind of database. If LR were using MySql then it would actually be quite easy to run background backups, even while the LR application was in use. I have worked on a number of applications that use MySql.

I also respect the LR engineers. It's a nice product and every one of them doubtless knows a LOT more about image processing than I do. But about databases? Maybe not.

Anyway, as someone else has suggested, this user would be equally happy with an option to "Backup and turn off computer when done." If there really is some arcane reason why it's really true that the routine has to be 4x as complicated if it needs to be able to be run at both the start and the end. And that code is just a one-liner! :-)




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dreed

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #63 on: July 15, 2010, 11:03:16 am »

Quote from: Schewe
Ever code in Lua? Not sure just how "object oriented" Lightroom is...I do know that the "state of the Lightroom Database" is critical when cuing up a database backup. Lightroom could be absolutely assured that upon launch, the database was then currently in a state of "nothing else going on"...and it's really, REALLY critical that the actual backup is NOT taking place while a critical background process might possibly be going on while a backup is taking place.

So, users decide backing up on launch is contra to the workflow of making sure you save work after doing it (well. DOH) complain. So Lightroom engineers spend the time and effort to make sure they code a SAFE BACKUP ON QUIT where they have to code explicit function to make sure all background processes have completed BEFORE the actual backup process.

When I said 4x the complexity, I was not kidding (nor pulling a number out of my ass). There was discussion amongst the engineers and alpha testers such as Seth Resnick who might spend 8-10 hours keywording thousands of images, who made a really good case that it made MORE sense to back up new work AFTER you do it, not before. Yes, I fell in that camp because I thought it was friggin' goofy to backup BEFORE you work.

So, keeping the old behavior wasn't an option...what would YOU do? Based on 80/20, the Lightroom engineers made the best decision possible. If you don't like it, don't use Lightroom. That's the bottom line.

See, I would be in the camp that would say Lightroom should be doing the equivalent of a snapshot backup when it launches and thereafter, writing a journal or creating incremental snapshots.

That way you don't have to wait until you quit the application for the backup to materialise. This is a lot more complicated than either "at launch" or "at quit" but does mean that if you've spent 6 and a half hours keywording and the system crashes, you would only lose (say) half an hour of changes because the main database was corrupted by an errant write as the system died and the last incremental snapshot was made at the 6 hour mark. If you were to quit, then it would create a new backup of the entire database and deletes all of the snapshots. Or you might say "do an incremental every 5 minutes and a full backup every hour." Or whatever.

Think of it as an "auto-backup" that doesn't need to backup the entire database while you are working.

Yup, that's a lot more complicated than what happens now, but for people who are spending an entire workday using the same instance of Lightroom, it has a lot more to offer than the current version. I suppose the chances are that something like this is too complicated for Lightroom's targe audience

Neither "quit" nor "launch" are appropriate as the only mechanism to create a backup for an application that people can spend 8 hours or more in.
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John R Smith

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #64 on: July 15, 2010, 12:47:03 pm »

I think you are really expecting far too much of an application like Lightroom. The "target audience" you mention is really the key, here. Lightroom is not an industrial-strength application designed for critical enterprise-wide end use in quite this way. It is not even multi-user. Here at work we use Sequel-Server based applications which have to be robust enough for several hundred simultaneous users, and they have a rollback function so that one can recover from a corrupt index or record with minimal data loss at any time. But LR is only 200 quid, for heaven's sake. What you get is a brilliant piece of software for editing and printing photographs for personal use. I wouldn't dream of rolling it out as my departmental solution to Digital Asset Management, but that is not it's intended function.

John
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DarkPenguin

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #65 on: July 15, 2010, 06:05:37 pm »

I want to buy the tutorials for the information they contain.  I could really give a [DELETED] about his attitude.


Quote from: John-S
Señor Schewe,

It would be in your best interest to tone it down. Why? Well simply, you and Michael sell tutorial videos, which are obviously for some sort of profit, or why bother. Personally, I don't need the tutorials, but there is a large audience who do and your attitude (for a long time now) downright sucks. So why would anyone want to buy the tutorials with your name associated with them?

Humility is grand. There will always be someone smarter, more creative, wiser, more talented and the list goes on and on. Facts of life. Someone will always have a higher perch. Being argumentative and just douchey isn't a quality you want associated with yourself.

Take some time away, update your website, get the copyright date at least to 2010. Modernize and readjust the attitude. Photo industry is shit, sure photography is fun and all, but this stuff is all self serving whether for our own art or a clients needs, it's still self serving which skews a lot of heads.
« Last Edit: July 16, 2010, 06:45:41 am by Chris Sanderson »
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feppe

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #66 on: July 15, 2010, 07:22:25 pm »

Quote from: Nick Walker
Comedic Interlude

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kpVovlKq2k...feature=related

I don't know what language they were speaking, but the moustaches convinced I'm on the righ track growing one.

Phil Indeblanc

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #67 on: July 15, 2010, 09:07:38 pm »

Quote from: Nick Walker
Comedic Interlude

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kpVovlKq2k...feature=related



That is funny stuff...It reminds me of how much I liked Benny Hill.


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Slobodan Blagojevic

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #68 on: July 15, 2010, 10:03:36 pm »

Quote from: John-S
Señor Schewe,

It would be in your best interest to tone it down. Why? Well simply, you and Michael sell tutorial videos, which are obviously for some sort of profit, or why bother. Personally, I don't need the tutorials, but there is a large audience who do and your attitude (for a long time now) downright sucks. So why would anyone want to buy the tutorials with your name associated with them?...
John, I guess you missed Mr. Schewe's earlier eloquent explanation on the subject, and I guess it would be too boring for him to repeat it, so, as a friendly gesture, I will do it   (excerpts from his post in an earlier thread):

Quote
[Schewe]... I don't take the mentality that I want something from ANYBODY, so you can pretty much forget about me treating you all like a potential "client" and being "nice" to you because I want you to buy something from me. Do, or don't based entirely on your own wishes and desires...but you seriously shouldn't be expecting any particularly behavior from me in that regard...

At this point in my career, there is nothing I can be induced to do for money...I'm retired from advertising photography largely because in order to be successful as an ad shooter, you _DO_ have to treat idiots and a$$holes like they matter. And...they simply don't matter to me anymore...

DarkPenguin

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #69 on: July 15, 2010, 10:12:09 pm »

Quote from: John-S
DarkPenguin,

There is hope, you could well be the last vestige of audience members for Tom Cruise and Mel Gibson movies. Bravo. Stand by them. They will need your strength in their final hours.

If they produce a film worth watching I'll watch it.
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Schewe

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #70 on: July 15, 2010, 11:17:52 pm »

Quote from: John-S
Jeff is succeeding at being a douche and by all means he seems quite content of it. It's nothing new, it goes back years on this forum. Like I've said, I've had enough of douches.


Hum...I don't recall ever calling somebody here on the forums a name such as "a douche"...if you think I'm a douche, what does that say about you bud? I'm gruff and verbally aggressive...but I personally draw the line at calling people names. You apparently don't. So I would say that's a bit like the pot calling the kettle black.
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Phil Indeblanc

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #71 on: July 15, 2010, 11:59:27 pm »

Quote from: Schewe
Hum...I don't recall ever calling somebody here on the forums a name such as "a douche"...if you think I'm a douche, what does that say about you bud? I'm gruff and verbally aggressive...but I personally draw the line at calling people names. You apparently don't. So I would say that's a bit like the pot calling the kettle black.


Schewe...you dont have to kiss anyones tush. I think people on this or any respectable forum expect others to treat them and them on to others at some level of professioanl and most of all...OPEN MINDED approach. I think many people come here to either gain insite or have questions to probelms or thoughts, complaints getting it off the chest sorta speak....  There is a human approach and a mechanical approach.  The human approach can shift, it can morph, adapt, improve, fall apart even, and mostly survive.  The mechanical approach is always give back the same you put into it, it doesn't know any other way, it will be accurate to only what it is loaded with to its capacity. It will not see a different point of view, and if it doesn't do or see something that computes to its own equasion, it will go onto the next or get stuck.

Being the former takes some , some....I think John or someone called it social skills.  Well it takes an open mind.

Now that I am a bit older and aging, I find those who either have it in their mind and have learned about life, and surely those who have had children, understand this a little better.  Sometimes when we are alone and used to being so....just ensure that block and it keeps things at a distance.  
I really dont know where I am going with this and how it applies to you, but if you can gain something from it...I hope you can come around with a surprising and tranquil approach, and mostly an open mind.
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Christopher Sanderson

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Backups now done on quit - whose bright idea was that?
« Reply #72 on: July 16, 2010, 06:41:21 am »

OK kids - time to put a cork in it. Topic closed.
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