Losing Categories?

[nelsonpj]

I'm having a strange problem with iSilo Palm 4.05RC2 running on my Clie TH55. I've been running 4.05 since the first beta, and have categorized about 80 ebooks and clips that are all located in the default PALM/PROGRAMS/iSilo folder on my MemoryStick.

I switched over to RC2 last week (previously running beta4 - I must have missed RC1 when on vacation). I've found that ebook categories don't seem to 'stick', or at least they don't 'edit' properly. If I'm in a specific view (say a view called 'read' for books I've already read) when I call up the category of one of the books by clicking on it's icon, it shows all categories 'unchecked', including the 'read' category that I called it from! If I don't click on any categories and click 'cancel' in the dialog box, iSilo seems to 'lose' the category assignment, and the file dissapears from the 'read' view! Switching to another program (i.e. Datebook) and running iSilo again seems to 'regenerate' the original category list, but the categories for the ebook are still blank when they're called up. If I 're-assign' the category to 'read' and click OK, the category seems to 'stick' - but I don't want to have to do that for all my ebooks.

If I change the category to something completely different (i.e. reassign to 'reference' for reference books) the ebook will disappear from the current list, and show up in the 'reference' list. However, when I restart iSilo after running another program, the ebook will be back in the old list, and not in the 'reference' list! Clicking on the ebook's icon and calling up the category list will show the ebook assigned to the 'reference' category (?). Clicking 'cancel' will cause the book to disappear from the 'read' view and it will then be back in the 'reference' view (until I restart iSilo)

I think this may have something to do with the 'caching' option. I'm currently running 100K cache (found under the menu Options/Document List). However, if I set it down to 1K (smallest setting), I lose all document categorization except for those I've recently categorized. Restarting iSilo doesn't get my category list back (even setting it back up to 100K). I've got a backup copy of iSiloDocSettingsDB_.pdb on my memory stick from MSBackup that I can copy back to my Clie to restore my category list, but I still have the weird category assignment problems. Maybe this file has become corrupted? Do I have to trash this prefs file and completely rebuild my category assignments?

[Voltage Spike]

I don't really have any advice at the moment, but I do have a question. Do you any of your document specify default categories (http://isilox.com/support/manual/iSiloX/ReferenceManual/DocumentProperties/Document.htm)? If so, do these documents behave differently in any way (e.g., revert to default categories)?

[iSilo]

The problem you describe is probably a result of a bug in one of the earlier betas that creates multiple entries of a document in iSilo's document settings database, thus corrupting it. As a result, viewing the categories for a given document in different views may give different categorizations for the document.

Unfortunately, the only way to remove the remnants of this bug is to delete the document settings database, as you suggest, and thus start from the beginning.

[nelsonpj]

OK, I'll try deleting the prefs database and re-entering my categories. Yesterday I tried to re-enter each category assignment without deleting the prefs database, but I still had similar problems (although I would get the proper 'checkmark' in the category list for each file). Oh well... this is one of the perils of beta-testing!

[iSilo]

To clarify, you need to delete the database named "_iSiloDocSettingsDB_", not the entry in the saved preferences database for iSilo. You can delete the database from within iSilo by going to the document list view's List menu and tapping "Delete Special...". In the "Delete Special" form, tap "Delete Settings Database..." and then tap "Yes" in the confirmation alert.

[nelsonpj]

It's been a few days since I deleted the iSiloDocSettingsDB file, and everything seems OK. I must have had a corrupt file. Thanks for the help...

[treerip]

Also using a CLIE TH55 (sony interpretation of palm o/s 5.2.1), but installed 4.05rc2 over RTM version 4.01. I can't remember the exact message, but received an initial message about database conversion required when starting 4.05rc2 for the first time. Responded sure, destroy the old DB.

Started categorizing 40+ iSilox (4.x/3.x) generated books only to have the same result mentioned above. Figured the fourms would have a fix/work-around and followed exactly the steps above to delete the settings DB from the iSilo menus. Exited iSilo, then went back in to recategorize the docs. Then opened a doc, exited the doc, and then most of the docs lost their category association.

Things to note:
1. All docs are on MS Pro 256MB media in dir /palm/programs/iSilo.
2. iSilo is installed inside built in memory, not MS media.
3. Deleted the default categories "buisness" and "Personal" since I don't use them.

Anyone have some other suggestions I can try or can I provide any further info?

Cheers!