[ipadonice]

Hello, 

I used the following setup for several years: 


* Synology NAS with Synology Drive that syncs all the sheet music between several devices into a folder on my devices
* Old Android tablet with Mobile Sheets pro. I manually imported new sheet music from the folder into the library

Now I bought an iPad pro 13:
* I'd like to use my old library with all my notes and metadata on the iPad
* I want to use the synced folder for this
* If I use a backup, the app will not the synced data but do a copy. 

What I tried:
* Synced sheet music on iPad
* Imported Android mobilesheets.db
* Tried to fix the path by automatic change. This results in a crash. As soon I link a file to the new path the app crashes and closes.
* Tried to modify the .db  - Problem: I don't get the path on iOS. (I'm new to Apple, I can't find a path like folder/folder/file, just paths like "random location > random folder > file".


Do you have any ideas on this usecase? :-)

[Zubersoft]

Is there a reason you don't want to use the sync library feature that's built-in to MobileSheets itself? Regardless, file paths are stored relative to the storage location, so you shouldn't be having to mess with the database at all as long as you didn't uncheck the option to "Let MobileSheets Manage my Files". If you unchecked that and have been importing files from another location, then it's not going to be easy to do what you are trying to do. I would recommend starting over, change the storage location to the folder under which all of your files are stored, leave "Let MobileSheets Manage my Files" on, and import your files from under that folder. They should be left at their original location, and then you can just sync the database file itself between Android and iOS (and the PDFs and such as well) and it should be seamless.

Mike

[ipadonice]

Hi Mike,
Thanks for your quick answer.
My data ecosystem is built around private storage with my NAS. Using Dropbox on top is additional effort. But if it’s the only way I will try.

I unchecked „let MS manage my files“ because I don’t see an advantage in creating copies for every file. You wouldn’t do that with your music library, too. But maybe I haven’t thought of everything ?

[Zubersoft]

I didn't say you had to use Dropbox - I just said if you don't want to use the built-in synchronization functionality, you will just have to sync the database file between devices (at a bare minimum). As I mentioned before, you don't have to duplicate files. You just need to have all your files under one folder, and you change the storage location to that folder. If you then import those files into MobileSheets, it will recognize that they are already under the storage location and it won't move or copy them. So then you get the best of both worlds - you can manage your own files under that folder with no files being duplicated, but also easily synchronize the database between devices. On iOS, due to the restrictive file system, you already have to keep everything under the MobileSheets folder, so you would just have to ensure that you have the same folder structure under that folder as you have on Android.

Mike

[ipadonice]

 I just said if you don't want to use the built-in synchronization functionality, you will just have to sync the database file between devices (at a bare minimum). 

My fault, I didn't get that point. 
I'm experimenting with a test database and I'm trying to implement your recommendation, but I'm running into problems:

You just need to have all your files under one folder, and you change the storage location to that folder. 

This works on my Android device. 

If you then import those files into MobileSheets, it will recognize that they are already under the storage location and it won't move or copy them. So then you get the best of both worlds - you can manage your own files under that folder with no files being duplicated, but also easily synchronize the database between devices. On iOS, due to the restrictive file system, you already have to keep everything under the MobileSheets folder, so you would just have to ensure that you have the same folder structure under that folder as you have on Android.

I'm not sure, if I'm doing things right here: 
Database and sheetmusic are in the same folder due to the custom database-folder, that I selected on  my android device. I synced that folder to my iOS device. But: On iOS I can't select a custom database-folder, because this configuration is missing. 

Edit: Seems like I‘ve hit the borders of iOS quite fast, this is my second day with the new iPad. I tried to start a new library.
It‘s not possible to not make copies because of the right-system I think. In MS is no option to select if the app should manage the files or not. Due to this it‘s not possible to select a whole folder for importing if it‘s not in the „on my iPad“ selection, even if I select another location (the same where my sheet music is) for the app in the configuration. I also tried importing via dropbox, but it did only import 5 files out of 21 without more information. Is there maybe a logfile for it? 
I also tried to sync directly into the MS folder, but the sync app (Synology Drive) makes it impossible to select a local folder. It always syncs into an own space on the iPad. 

This is really frustrating - I‘m not mad at you at all, it‘s probably the iOS restrictions making things difficult. 

I think I will stay with one device (iPad) and will manually copy files from the synced folder into the „on my iPad“ folder  as long there is no better solution for this. :-( 

[Zubersoft]

With iOS, the file restrictions make it impossible for apps to access files outside of their application folder. Temporary access is granted if a file is picked using Apple's file picker, but access cannot be persisted to a folder. That is why there is no option to manage your own files or to change the storage location on iOS - the operating system makes that impossible.

You will have to manually copy files and then import them from the sounds of it. I'm assuming you don't want to use the cloud, but that's normally the easiest solution to synchronize between Android and iOS.

Mike