Author Topic: Setting the number of Desktop archives  (Read 8149 times)

Neil Waldhauer

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1024
  • Karma: +24/-0
    • View Profile
    • Blonde Guy
Setting the number of Desktop archives
« on: February 01, 2016, 12:03:16 am »
In the Desktop properties of eComStation, you can set the number of archives that the system keeps.

But if you set the system to keep 7 archives, then later set it back to 3, it will continue keeping 7 archives.

The number you set seems to be kept in ARCHBASE.$$$, byte 216. I do not know where the number OS/2 uses is kept.
Expert consulting for ArcaOS, OS/2 and eComStation
http://www.blondeguy.com

Doug Bissett

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1593
  • Karma: +4/-2
    • View Profile
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #1 on: February 01, 2016, 06:32:28 am »
Is it actually still rotating 7, or is it simply rotating 3, and ignoring the other 4? If it is ignoring 4 of them, they should probably be removed.

Neil Waldhauer

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1024
  • Karma: +24/-0
    • View Profile
    • Blonde Guy
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #2 on: February 01, 2016, 06:02:22 pm »
Yes, it's actively rotating through all 7. Desktop is set to keep 3 copies. I'd have liked it to delete the other 4 automatically. Did the original IBM properties provide for a number of copies?
Expert consulting for ArcaOS, OS/2 and eComStation
http://www.blondeguy.com

ivan

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1558
  • Karma: +17/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #3 on: February 01, 2016, 09:28:46 pm »
In our WSeB boxes the base number of desktop archives is three PLUS the Maintenance desktop 0X and the CURRENT making a total of five.

ARCHBASE.$$$ holds the information as to where the archives are stores and ARCHIVES.$$$ (in the archive directory) gives the archive details as seen on the AltF1 startup screen.

You could delete the unwanted backups but you would need to also edit the ARCHIVES.$$$ file to reflect what remains.

Andreas Schnellbacher

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 827
  • Karma: +14/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #4 on: February 01, 2016, 11:24:48 pm »
Neil, in case you want just your inis being saved, Rich's DMT should be a more valuable tool for recovering than the standard WPS archiving. It recognizes ini corruption well, offers then a menu automatically and also on demand. It has worked for me all the times I had to use it. Since confirmed to work well, I don't use XWP's WPS archiving anymore. There are still situations when XWP warns about ini corruption but at the reboot it shows that it was false alarm, where DMT was always right.

Neil Waldhauer

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1024
  • Karma: +24/-0
    • View Profile
    • Blonde Guy
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #5 on: February 02, 2016, 05:13:12 am »
Has someone documented the ARCHBASE.$$$? Because I checked using HexEdit, and there is no instance of the number 7 in the file. So how does it keep making 7 backups?
Expert consulting for ArcaOS, OS/2 and eComStation
http://www.blondeguy.com

ivan

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1558
  • Karma: +17/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #6 on: February 02, 2016, 12:52:43 pm »
ARCHBASE.$$$ on all our machines just contains C:\OS2\ARCHIVES if it is on the main boot partition and H:\OS2\ARCHIVES if on the maintenance partition.

Are you sure that all 7 of the archives are being updated and not just 01 to 03 with 04 to 07 just being there?  Our test box once had the number of desktop archives set to 10 (using xworkplace replace desktop archiving) which gave us 12 archives in the archive directory.  Since then it has been returned to 4 and only the first 4 are actually updated although the other 6 + 2 are still there (I just checked and will see about removing the 6 when I'm on night shift again).

Neil Waldhauer

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1024
  • Karma: +24/-0
    • View Profile
    • Blonde Guy
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #7 on: February 02, 2016, 05:52:28 pm »
Look for files like this in \OS2\BOOT

Code: [Select]
3-22-15   5:20          10,623      0  CONFIG.1
11-22-14  10:56          10,621      0  CONFIG.2
 8-11-14  21:29           8,751      0  CONFIG.3
 6-11-14  19:51           5,991      0  CONFIG.M
 6-11-14  19:52           6,309      0  CONFIG.X

The seven archives machine has 7 + 2 of these, too.
Expert consulting for ArcaOS, OS/2 and eComStation
http://www.blondeguy.com

ivan

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1558
  • Karma: +17/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Setting the number of Desktop archives
« Reply #8 on: February 02, 2016, 07:40:28 pm »
Those are copies of the config.sys files that also appear in the archives directory (I assume they are in the boot directory for ease of use).  The numbered items in each archive sub directory are in the order that appears in OS2.KEY which we edit to include lan and tcpip config files.