Backups

[Jeremy Garchow]

Is too many backups a bad thing. 🙂

Really, the only thing that hs been added is library backups, the other backups were in place in 10.0.3 or something.

[Bret Williams]

I think I see the problem. You updated all your projects and events together into one singular library? In the movies folder on your internal, is the backups of your libraries. You only have one. Inside that library you have multiple projects. Within the event, in your second example, you see the backups of each project. There has always be the one backup of a project. The previous version. I’ve never quite been sure how to use that and figured I’d COW it if I ever needed to.

But the backup in your movies folder works exactly like autosaves in FCP 7. It’s going to open a previous version of your library. And if you haven’t figured out yet, libraries are generally treated like legacy “projects.” And in this case they definitely are. To access these backups, which are simply numbered by a timestamp inside a folder with the name of the library, just like autosaves of legacy, you go to file>open library>from backup. You’ll be given choices of dates and times of the backups for that library of when you want to restore.

Now, since you can’t do a “save as” in FCP X like legacy, this could be a very dangerous thing. I’m not sure what happens when you choose one of these libraries. Does it replace the current library? In legacy, you could open it, check it out, copy something from it, or save it over the current project, etc. But since X is in charge of it’s own saving, it could be disastrous.

Why apple got rid of saving I have no idea. And why they screwed it up in their other apps with “duplicates” and all that other crap I have no idea. FWIW, if anyone is sick of not having “save as” in other apple apps like pages, just hold down option and go to the file menu and there it is. Save as. But not in FCP X.

Here’s my backups folder right now for example. One library for each project…

[Bill Davis]

[Bret Williams] “Why apple got rid of saving I have no idea. And why they screwed it up in their other apps with “duplicates” and all that other crap I have no idea. FWIW, if anyone is sick of not having “save as” in other apple apps like pages, just hold down option and go to the file menu and there it is. Save as. But not in FCP X.
“

But they didtn’t actually “get rid” of saving. They just made it a persistent auto-function.”

They moved to a finder wide system where saving is a process of storing incrementall metadata updates just like the autosave works in X.

Essentially you don’t need to “Save As” if there’s a automatically generated archive of timed states of your work as it’s progressed. SaveAs merely cut a paritcular document off from it’s own history. And if you DO Want to cut the document off from it’s history – what do you need? Oh, a DUPLICATE of where it is right now.

The new system exists because unlike when SaveAs was important – storage is cheap and computers are fast and text strings can be massive and still handled and passed around virtually instantly with all their history intact in a single file.

Save As is gone because it’s largely an attifact of an era where computers were slow and less dependable and you always had to write a copy of everything to fixed media, just order to be “safe.”

The only ones discomforted by it are guys like you and me who had lots and lots of years to get accustomed to expecting the old system.

ANd yes, I sometimes miss it too. But I’m getting over it – slowly.

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com – video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.

[Bret Williams]

Understood. And not usually a problem. In fact, I’ve never lost more than a single action when X has crashed. But now, with the library autosaves, it seems there is an issue. What if I do a restore? It seems it will replace the current? Yes, the current state would have an autosave too, but doesn’t that start to become messy?

I know what I would do. I’d open the autosave library from the finder so that it opens alongside my current iteration and I could copy over a project or element that I needed to.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Bret Williams] ” What if I do a restore? It seems it will replace the current? Yes, the current state would have an autosave too, but doesn’t that start to become messy? “

You can Finder dupe libraries and open that dupe. People hated how FCPX “did everything for you” including backups. Well, now, you have more control and the mess is in your hands.

If you think of a Library as an FCP7 project file that can hold media, it’s much easier.

There are, of course, different nuances and functionalities, but having automated backups or user created backups isn’t all that bad in my opinion.

If you open a Backup with the “Open Library > from Backup” command, a copy opens next to the original that is dated the time the backup was made. It is the exact same thing as opening it form the Finder by double clicking, or opening the Library from within FCPX.

As far as keeping both of them, you probably wouldn’t work on both of them at the same time, but you could certainly rename the backup the same as your current Library and keep working in case of disaster.

[Bret Williams]

Have you tried it? It is bullet proof, but the instant you double click the backup library, it duplicates that backup library to the same folder as the library it is a backup of, AND instantly begins consolidating the media. So the media no longer links to the media in the original. It’s essentially bullet proof, so I can now immediately delete the original (after the consolidate is complete) and rename the backup to the name of the original. Great. But geez, by double clicking that backup file, I lost 27gigs of HD space no questions asked or warnings given. I suppose it might have said something if I didn’t have enough space.

Sometimes it’s good to work through all these things and see what happens!

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Bret Williams] “Have you tried it? “

I have.

[Bret Williams] “It is bullet proof, but the instant you double click the backup library, it duplicates that backup library to the same folder as the library it is a backup of, AND instantly begins consolidating the media. So the media no longer links to the media in the original. It’s essentially bullet proof, so I can now immediately delete the original (after the consolidate is complete) and rename the backup to the name of the original. Great. But geez, by double clicking that backup file, I lost 27gigs of HD space no questions asked or warnings given. I suppose it might have said something if I didn’t have enough space.”

It really seems to be nearly the same thing as restoring the backup in FCPX. All my media is usually external.

The backup files are very small as they are stripped of ANY media.

But I find that if I double click a backup, it ends up the same size as the original minus any project renders and Proxy media. Linked media remains linked.

If you dupe the backup. move it, and open it, it loses the connection to the original, but stays smaller.

[Mark Spencer]

1) Our training was incorrect, the backups are stored in the Movies folder as you discovered

2) Opening a backup doesn’t affect the current library. It’s completely separate.

3) Backups of libraries don’t include media, even if the library is “managed” -e.g., media is store in the library. Rather, the backup contains sym links to the actual media location

4) They’ve worked just fine in our testing.
Mark

—
Mark Spencer
Freelance Producer/Editor/Motion Graphics Artist
Apple-certified Master Trainer
Author, Motion 4 from Peachpit Press
https://www.applemotion.net

[Bret Williams]

On this current project, I keep the camera originals external, but the AVCHD that had to be rewrapped isn’t, since the project started as a 10.0.9 project. That’s 27gigs. So, the interesting thing is that the backups are only 15megs. They obviously link directly to the media in the event of the original library. Something you can’t do normally. But, upon double clicking or restoring that project, it places a copy of it right beside the original it’s backing up, and immediately consolidates it so it to balloons to 27gigs just like the library it’s backing up. The library I double clicked remains where it is at 15mb. It’s very smart. But sure sucks up the drive space.

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Mark Spencer] “1) Our training was incorrect, the backups are stored in the Movies folder as you discovered”

That is the default location, but backups can be stored anywhere of your choosing in the prefs:

backups.png