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Author Topic: Workflow app crash - corrupts database - massive data loss  (Read 6254 times)

Weaver

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Workflow app crash - corrupts database - massive data loss
« on: July 13, 2018, 11:58:59 PM »

I have been writing ipad programs using the Apple Workflow programming environment. This afternoon a bug in the Workflow app corrupted the main database in which all the programs I have written are stored. I lost six months work because it was not backed up to iCloud either. I found a very outdated copy on another ipad. I spent hours on the phone and internet chat to Apple support, another session due tomorrow morning, but despit all my efforts could not find the lost database stored in any iCloud backup.

Luckily, I did not trust the Workflow system as far as I could throw it, so I write a backup app which saves all the program modules into a version-numbered zip file and copies it to the iCloud drive. I had done a backup a week ago, not good, but a lot better than six months. I lost several days work on a new tool for programming modems.

I was assured that Apple devs will get the crash dump, logs etc which we will collect tomorrow.

Be very very careful if you use this buggy tool. My zip-to-icloud backup routine is quite short and has been worth its weight in gold.
« Last Edit: July 14, 2018, 12:01:35 AM by Weaver »
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burakkucat

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Re: Workflow app crash - corrupts database - massive data loss
« Reply #1 on: July 14, 2018, 12:30:37 AM »

I had done a backup a week ago, not good, but a lot better than six months. I lost several days work on a new tool for programming modems.

  :(

<Nods.> The keywords, in any situation, are backup, backup and - er - backup.
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:cat:  100% Linux and, previously, Unix. Co-founder of the ELRepo Project.

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sevenlayermuddle

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Re: Workflow app crash - corrupts database - massive data loss
« Reply #2 on: July 14, 2018, 12:34:13 AM »

I have never explored Workflow.   But is it not possible to use a source control system such as svn or git?

For my own source I use svn, not the most modern or the most trendy, but easy to set up and it does the job.   In addition, at 4am every morning, a backup script kicks in which replicates the svn repository over two different HDDs, of different brands and capacities (to reduce probability of impact by OS bugs).   The same script also creates an ISO image, including the svn repo and lots else, that I can burn to Blu Ray if I feel inclined, such as if I have just reached a big milestone.  In that case of course,  I always burn two, one of which is stored off site.

My scripts save every iso image for the past week, one iso image a month for the past year, again replicated on two totally different HDDs.

You will see, I regard “sudden corruptions” as perfectly normal events, based on a lifetime career in sw dev.   They do happen, always have, and always will.   :)
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Weaver

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Re: Workflow app crash - corrupts database - massive data loss
« Reply #3 on: July 14, 2018, 12:24:33 PM »

Something like SVN is just what I need. I would need to find an ios client though, and would also have to extract the code from the workflow database in which all the code is stored. It is their crappy database design which went wrong in the first place that is the barrier, all the code is inside some black-box. However there is a function that will pull modules out of the database and allow them to be written to a .wflow file and it was these that I zipped up. Using a reverse-delta based source version control system would be vastly more space efficient than using zip files too.

iOS is so limited though, it is trying to grow out of its iphone toy-o/s origins to become a real system but the process of working its way back to sanity and standard expectations is taking its sweet time.
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