How many records do I have?

["Enrique Lynch" <lynch@nospam.trivium.gh.ub.es>]

Dear NB's,

I recently updated my laptop Ibidem datafiles following a procedure 
that, until now, never caused problems. It consists in copying the 
*.#O# files from the database folder on the desktop machine to the 
its corresponding mirror on the laptop by way of a commuter disk. 
Once done, I used to re-index the Ibidem database to avoid getting 
the usual error messages ("Illegal record number" usw.). This time I 
was unable to re-index. Ibidem reported something like "Cannot create 
index file". When called to screen, however, Ibidem would let me 
scroll up & down the database but all records newly added where 
simply omitted from the table view. I tried to re-index two or more 
times and noticed that:

a) Program created on the database (laptop) folder a new folder with 
the name of my database. A number of auxiliary files which I had 
never seen before showed on this folder.

b) Indexing affected ONLY the first three datafiles. The fourth, 
containing recent additions, was skipped.

Obvious to say that everything runs OK on the desktop machine. So I 
decided to simply copy & paste all the Ibidem files, datafiles and 
program files, from one computer to the other.  This worked as a 
partial solution. Now I have sort of clone database on my laptop and 
all my records are accesible but I still find puzzling Ibidem would 
not re-index an appended datafile on the laptop.

Now, the only difference between this datafiles and the previous ones 
is the size. I have the following datafiles:

LIBROS    #00      999147 Kb       
LIBROS    #01      231805 Kb  
LIBROS    #02      261882 Kb  
LIBROS    #03      262133 Kb      
LIBROS    #04      814710 Kb

I don't know why  #00 is so big compared to #01, #02 and #03 but I 
think that this was the effect of Maintain executed in NBDos. Libros 
is my personal library database, which I started in the Dos days and 
eventually imported into NBWIN. The size of  #04, which again is 
disproportionate to the other datafiles can only be the result of my 
periodic adding of short titles to the records, a step I had omitted 
previously and I now regularly perform in order to take advantage of 
the short title citations in Ibidem. Every now and then I fiddle into 
my records and add the short titles to the old entries. 

I don't consider myself as a filthy kind of person, but I don't like 
electronic cleaning-ups, specially when databases are concerned. It 
might be mere superstition but anyway... However, I decided to take 
my chance on the laptop, having the desktop basis as a reference. So 
I went Maintain, and first compacted the datafiles, then I compacted 
the index files (I had never used these features before in NBWIN) 
and, in the end, I re-indexed everything. 

The database was accesible as before BUT:

a) I had no longer 3682 entries but 2847 although I am absolutely 
sure that I HAVE NOT ERASED 840 records from my library database!! 
Furthermore, I am absolutely sure that there are NO blank records on 
my database.

b) The sorting routine does not work properly. If I click on "Author" 
to sort alphabetically  the record inmmediately before the last entry 
is placed at the bottom of the sorted table view, overriding the 
alphabetical order. 

Where are my 840 missing records?
Does sorting by author work OK on other people's databases?
Why does Ibidem index a 800000-900000 kb datafile on one computer on 
one computer and refuses 
to do so on another?

Any comment will be greatly appreciated.

Best,

Enrique


Dr. Enrique Lynch
Departamento de Historia de la Filosofía, Estética y Filosofía de la 
Cultura
Universidad de Barcelona