Export all files for a given project as a backup?

[Ronn Kilby]

Yes – on a PC – that would be awesome. Thanks.

[Michael Hancock]

To use subst, you’ll need to open a command prompt and type a simple command. However, your archive folders must be set up right. To do that, set them up like this:

Say your archive hard drive is drive B:. I liked this folder structure – B:/CLIENT01/ProjectA/media. I want Windows to see the ProjectA folder like it’s a drive (no spaces can be used either – use underscores). For Avid to then see my media I need to make the Avid media folder structure in the ProjectA folder and put my media in it.

So, my archive would look like this: B:/CLIENT01/ProjectA/Avid MediaFiles/MXF/1/media

The space in Avid MediaFiles is ok, because we’re only telling the OS to look at ProjectA as a drive. You have to pick a drive letter, and it can’t be a drive already in use. In this example, we’ll use Drive X:

Now to bring our media online without moving it. Open a command prompt. Type exactly this (without quotes) “subst X: B:/CLIENT01/ProjectA” You’re telling the OS, substitute drive X: for the folder at B:/CLIENT01/ProjectA. When you open Explorer you’ll see a new Drive X: if you did it right. Open that drive and you should see an Avid MediaFiles.

When you launch Avid it will also see the new Drive X:, recognize its folder structure, and scan your drive, index and create new databases if necessary and your project is now online! The best part is you can open that project, do a revision, render and capture/import to Drive X:, thereby archiving as you work.

Let me know if this makes sense or if you run into issues. I used this exclusively when I was on a PC and could bring any project back online in a matter of seconds.

EDIT: I may have the slashes backwards – they were slashes originally but the Cow stripped them when I posted. Not sure why, so you may have to just use a everywhere I used a /

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Michael Hancock
Editor

[Ronn Kilby]

Great tip Michael – thanks – I’ll try it and report back if problematic.