On Mon, 6 Mar 2023, Jorge Quintanilla wrote:

jorge,

Judd or someone better informed than I am will probably provide a better
answer. But ... there would be a problem if the database formats differ
between the two models.

Just out of curiosity, why use both simultaneously? You can use one and keep
the other as a backup. Because I, too, am dependent on my Palm devices I
have three TX units here; use one and keep all three charged monthly. If I
need to use a replacement I will install the jpilot data on that handheld.

HTH,

Rich

Hello, thanks a lot for your answer.

I think what you propose would work for me, as I really do not need to
be able to use the two Palm devices at the same time, only to switch
from using one to using the other (and to have the option of switching
back). After a few trials, I have found the following works. I would be
happy to write a little step-by-step guide as I think this is something
many who are new to jpilot may find useful. However, I am pretty sure
there is a more elegant way to achieve the result so I would appreciate
your guidance:

1. Starting point: a Palm m100 which is correctly working with jpilot.
2. Just to be sure, I started by synchronising and backing up the Palm
   m100. I then copied the whole .jpilot directory somewhere safe in
   case we need to restore it at some point.
3. I then put aside the m100.
4. I reset the III-xe using the pin-operated button at the back. It
   displays the Palm logo and asks me to confirm the time, date and
   location.
5. I connect the III-xe to my computer using the same RS232 HotSync
   cable I used for my m100.
6. On jpilot, File --> Install User. I use the same user name as on the
   m100 but a new user ID number (the one suggested by jpilot). jpilot
   asks me to press the HotSync button, which I do, and the process
   seems to run without trouble.
7. (DO NOT at this point try to HotSync the new Palm device. If you do,
   jpilot will display a warning message. Heed the warning! If you are
   foolish and do not heed the warning, you will end up with blank
   databases on both the new Palm device and jpilot. At that point, the
   only safe way to proceed will be to overwrite the .jpilot directory
   with the backup copy we made on step 2 and start again.)
8. On jpilot, select Restore handheld (still with the III-xe in the
   cradle).
9. It seems to be going well, with jpilot informing me that I need to
   do a HotSync to update the Palm.
10. The III-xe informs me that I need to do a rest and asks me to
    confirm, which I do.
11. The III-xe reset and asks me at the confirm enter date, time, and
    location.
12. After that everything seems fine with both jpilot and Palm III-xe
    having correct databases. Subsequent syncs with the III-xe work both
    ways without trouble.

Presumably should I want to then go back to using my m100 I would have
to do the same as above, but in reverse.

I do have a nagging worry that the OS versions are different, my m100 is
3.5 while my III-xe is 4.1. Could that lead to trouble?

Thanks again for your help, and greetings from snowy England!

Jorge

On 06/03/2023 19:10, Rich Shepard wrote:

On Mon, 6 Mar 2023, Jorge Quintanilla wrote:

Jorge,

I strongly recommend that you do daily backups (check out dirvish.org). Then
you'll always have a backup when you need it.

That's why you need to treat each one separately.

Yeah, here in the Portland, Oregon there was 10.8 inches of snow last
Tuesday-Wednesday. Records at Portland airport started in 1939 and the greatest
amount of snow recorded there was 14.6 inches. Two years earlier, the city
recorded 16 inches of snow in one day. I'm about 20km east of the Portland
airport at the west end of the Columbia River Gorge and with typical winter
winds had accumulations of about 12 inches.

Regards,

Rich

Rich,

Thanks! I do that already, I just thought if something went wrong I
didn't need to dip into the last backup, just opcy the folder back. But
I didn't know about dirvish, thanks!  :-)

I think this is the bit that I don't know how to do. The documentation
says something about JPILOT_HOME it was too concise for me to follow.

Amazing. Snow in March pretty much everywhere in the Northern hemisphere.

Thank you so much for being patient with me.

On Tue, 7 Mar 2023, Jorge Quintanilla wrote:

Jorge,

Use only one handheld, keep the other as a backup. I belive that if you
need/want to use the other handheld you can restore jpilot to it.

Regards,

Rich

On 3/6/23 13:36, Jorge Quintanilla wrote:

Hi Jorge,

It is always nice to see new or returning users.

You are not the first person to request this feature. I even wanted it back when I had multiple Palm OS devices.

The sync protocol on PalmOS was not very robust. If you modify a record on the Palm it gets marked "dirty". If you modify it on the desktop it gets marked "dirty". On the next sync the dirty records get sent to the other side and the dirty flag is removed. Each record has a unique ID. If a record is dirty on both sides there is a conflict and it requires the user to select which one to keep. For instance, there is no elegant logic to determine that the Last name was changed on the desktop and the first name on the Palm, therefore the newest first name and newest last name should be merged during a sync.

There is not much other metadata about the records and I do not think it is possible to know how to merge the records from multiple devices. I don't know if Palm did this because it was simple code from a start-up company, or if its due to a requirement to sync at 9600 baud or having a slow processor. It doesn't really matter.

If you understand how the sync process works you may be able to make some hack work for you. Do you plan on changing info on both Palms and in jpilot, or just jpilot and one Palm? Or something else? Answer this and I will see if something would work.

The JPILOT_HOME env var will just tell jpilot to look in another place for the .jpilot directory. That way you can have many jpilots or Palm devices to sync. Just not with each other.

IIRC, it was somewhere around Palm OS 4.3 that they changed to the newer DBs (Calendar, Contacts, Tasks, Memos). These may (probably) cause problems if you put a DB from an older Palm on it and vice-versa. There was also a Calendar problem between two different Palms with the same or very close to the same OS. If you install one of these you will get a boot loop and need to reset the Palm. I think the two you are using will work fine together.

Judd

Dear Judd,

First of all thank you very much let me tell you how grateful I am to
you for jpilot. I used my Palm m100 literally all the time for several
years during 1999-2004. For various reasons, I stopped using it for a
long time. Recently I went back and I was shocked by how much more
natural and useful it is for me than gmail/outlook calendars on a mobile
phone. But without jpilot it would have been simply too impractical to
go back to Palm.

Secondly thank you very much for your patient explanations (and Rich too!)

Once I started using my Palm everyday again, I became naturally
concerned about Palm Day. I decided to run some really simple user-level
experiments. I needed a device I was not using for anything crucial so I
got my second Palm. I then realised the III-xe is in some ways nicer
(bigger screen so easier to read) so I thought I'd give it a go. Ideally
I would have liked to be able to switch back and forth between them but
your very clear explanation has made me give up on that. I think, from
what you wrote, it might work if you never change a record on both
palms, only create new ones/delete old ones, but I couldn't gurantee
that is what I would do. In any case, for my use case being able to go
from using one (and only that one) to using the other is enough, and the
procedure I described works for that. I will use the III-xe for a while,
and if I decide to go back to the m100 I now know how to restore it. And
in either case I will have a backup device in case the other one breaks,
with the database kept safe on .jpilot. Brilliant!

Thank you for clarifying the intended purpose of JPILOT_HOME, I
understand now that its intended use is not much to do with my specific
"problem".

We now need a solution for Palm Day... (Which, I note, does not affect
jpilot. It may well be that cloning the Palm devices is easier now than
fixing them...)

Thanks again,

And all the best,

Jorge

On 07/03/2023 00:55, Judd Montgomery wrote:

Am 07.03.23 um 01:55 schrieb Judd Montgomery:

Hi Judd,

in this context I have a question about the difference between "Sync" and "Backup".

Imagine, I have one Palm device and two instances of JPilot or maybe mixed with Palm Desktop on two computers.

When I have modified a record on the Palm, the dirty flag is set.

When I sync with JPilot 1, the change becomes copied to JPilot 1 and the dirty flag becomes reset.

When I then sync the Palm with JPilot 2 or Palm Desktop on the other Computer, the change in that record never becomes copied to computer 2, right?

So what is when I do a backup instead on JPilot 2? Does it only copy the old files to the backup location and then do a normal sync?
Or does "Backup" overwrite all records at JPilot 2 even there are no more dirty flags?

And if on both sides the dirty flag is set, then on sync the record becomes duplicated on both sides, right?

-Ulf

On Tue, 7 Mar 2023, Ulf Zibis wrote:

Ulf,

Were I running two copies of jpilot I'd use rsync to keep them, er
synchronized.

Rich