My workplace is driving me crazy!

[John@Kapoo]

With out being specific as I'm sure it happens alot on LANs - The prob I/we are having is when one person views info in a in-house database, then closes it and want to edit maybe one of the images that was viewed in the database - the image file is locked and not able to either open or edit and works visa versa. It is annoying (to say the least!) when you have to either keep closing the database down or Photoshop. It doesn't always happen, but is often enough to be of an annoyance.

Now, in my fairy tale world that I'd love to live in there would be such a programme that can force the info that has just been viewed to be dumped without having to close any software down fully, but like I said... In my own fairy tail world that is. Anyhoooo, just thought I'd give a shout out on here just incase anyone is aware of anyway to get around the problem.

Thanks in advance for any feedback.

John

[Twey]

Not without some actual information, we aren't.

What sort of a "database" are we talking about here? The images are stored in the database? What operating systems are everything running?

[BLiZZaRD]

Not REALLY helpful in any way, but thought it might be *mentally* helpful...

When you have an "I hate my job day" try this:

On your way home from work stop at your pharmacy and go to the thermometer section and purchase a rectal thermometer made by Jonson&Johnson.

Be very sure you get this brand.

When you get home, lock the doors, draw the curtains and disconnect the phone so you will not be disturbed. Change into very comfortale clothing and sit in your favorite spot. Open the package and remove the thermometer.

Now, very carefully place the thermometer on the table or a surface so that it will not become chipped or broken. Now the fun part begins.

Take out the literature and read it carefully. You will notice that in small print there is a statement, "Every Rectal Thermometer made by Johnson&Johnson is personally tested".

Now, close your eyes and repeat out loud 5 times: "I am SO glad I do not work in the thermometer quality control department at Johnson&Johnson."

Have a nice day, and remember, there is ALWAYS someone else with a job that is more a pain in the ass than yours.

~BLiZZ

[Twey]

Yipe! :D
Don't know about you, but I think that would rather discourage me from wanting to use said thermometer, far from feeling the reassurance they presumably intend that message to provide.

[BLiZZaRD]

I dunno, I always used alcohol first.. just don't want to mix it up with the ORAL thermometer :D

[John@Kapoo]

Hi Twey.

We basically turn mail order catalogues into online shops and we do this by taking the text and images we are send from PDFs. All images edited in Photoshop, but certain things are done in the database to add content and associating the text to the images. So although the imagery is not stored in the database, but images are viewed in the database when it comes to associating text to imagery, however all the images are stored on a network drive.

Oh and cheers Blizzard, I'll keep that info in mind, lol. :D

[BLiZZaRD]

Always looking to help, LOL

[Twey]

So your problem is that two users cannot access one of these files on the network drive at the same time?

[djr33]

Yeah, that was my first guess.

You may think you want to get around it, but that's not a great idea. Even if you could rework things, you'd run into problems.

If two people open the same thing at the same time, they'd be constantly saving and deleting the others' work. So.... what possible reason would you need two people to have it open?

Unless you're just talking about viewing the image at the same time.

It is kinda stupid. But, still, at least it stops you from having weird file saving wars if two people decide to work on the same thing at the same time.

[Twey]

Aye, if two people saved at the same time, serious file corruption would result.

[djr33]

Also, if you simply need to view the files, you could do one of two things:
1. I think that there is a way to open as read-only, at least for the networks I've used, like at school.
2. You could always try to open the image (if a jpg/gif) in a web browser, rather than opening in photoshop. I'd assume that would have less chance of giving you an error than opening to edit in PS.

[John@Kapoo]

Oh, sorry guys guess I didn't make myself too clear.

User A: Open image - edits - saves - closes file. (All fine).

User B: Opens database to tick boxes (to add logos etc) and associating text to images etc.

Now the problem - If User B was to now close the part of the database with the associated image files that had just been edited previously in Photoshop prior to viewing in the database and now if User A tries to go back to edit images again, that would be fine, but not able to save image as what is was previously saved as until the database is fully shut down from User B. This of course leading to the irritation as at that moment, User B could now be viewing a totally different part of the database for a totally different page of a website.

Hope that makes it abit clearer? It is not a case of a file trying to be opened and edited at the same time - I was thinking it was more of a case of the database not dumping info correctly after being used unless you close programme fully which I believe to be the case? Is there anything out there or any methods that can be used to force the database to close all associated files correctly without having to close and open database every time?

Cheers peeps, I'm grateful for all input.

[Twey]

Ah, I see. It makes sense now -- well, almost.
When do the changes to the database actually take effect on the image?
You still haven't actually told us what database software this is.

[djr33]

Are you really using a database to host the images? Why can't you just use locations (local urls) in the DB, then save the images outside of it, saving you a heck of a lot of trouble.

[John@Kapoo]

Here is a screen shot of a typical page in the database:
http://img207.imageshack.us/my.php?image=databaseexample2ch.gif
As you can hopefully see, images are not edited in the database, but are used solely as a reference while ticking all the right boxes so to speak to associate the corresponding text to image. And that's where the problem is - If while in the database a prob is seen with an image for some reason, that page in the database will be closed so that the person who does the imagery can rework it in Photoshop - Then when this person tries to save the image again, it is not possible due to the database holding on to the info until fully shut down.

Did I just help or hinder? :D

[djr33]

Hmm... weird.

You're talking about recoding database software. Ew.

I still say find a way around it by using a location of the image, not an image in the database. That will fix all sharing issues.

The only other easy hope is just to find an option in the network/database software to allow what you're wanting. Unlikely, though.

[John@Kapoo]

The images are not stored in a database - All images are in folders on the network and the database views the images from those locations.

[Twey]

Aha! CPS. (celebrates) I've spent two pages trying to get that information out of you. :p
Well, there's not a huge amount you can do. The problem isn't the database: it's the fact that the database administration software opens the files it finds there. Since they're on a network drive, you can *probably* do something to allow multiple users opening the same file at once. Since the software never writes to the file, that would be perfectly safe; the worst that could happen is temporary image corruption on the database administration software, which could be fixed with a refresh.

[djr33]

If they're not stored in the database, not seeing how that is controlling them. I guess it's acting like an application having them open? Weird.
You could try to just force it to actually close the image when you are done with it. Not sure how this could be added, though.
No real clue beyond this, sorry. Just trying to work through the possibilities :)

[Twey]

If they're not stored in the database, not seeing how that is controlling them. I guess it's acting like an application having them open? Weird.He's failing to differentiate between the database and the database administration software. It's that that's opening them, not the database itself.

[djr33]

Ah, alright. Well... yeah, not sure what you could do then. Maybe you could have it open a copy of the images instead, so it would leave the originals, but that would probably be a lot of extra work.

[Diego]

Hey there.

From the screen shot, this looks like some off the shelf gui front end for your db. What would be most helpful would be the type of db being used (ex: MySQL, SQL, Oracle). Knowing what operating system the network is on couldn't hurt.

apart from going back to the developer of the tool you use, you could investigate implimenting some sort of version control for the files. CVS or SVN are very helpful in keeping changes user 1 makes to file A from breaking/blocking changes from user 2 on file A.

do you have a url to the company who made the tool?

any how, best of luck to ya sounds like a fun project.

[Twey]

If you look at the screenshot, you can see that the database is CPS -- I presume that the front-end is included.

A versioning system would probably not be appropriate here. The problem isn't that the developers are blocking one another, and there's certainly no need to maintain seperate versions of the files.