[Wendy Cutler]

So the question is: what did I do to deserve this?

I went to the open apps button on my Asus ZenPad 10 to go to MobileSheets, after I had just left it open but closed the screen last time I used it, which is what I normally do. This time, when I clicked the app to bring it back, it showed an Initializing Database message with that circle timer thing, for many minutes. It appeared to me that it was not going to initialize it, so I hit the home button, then re-opened the app. All seemed fine, but my latest setlist, which I had been using for at least a month (which is what was open when I last used the app), was missing, and several tunes in the setlist were missing. I am guessing that these were tunes that were only in that setlist, but I'm not sure of that. When I went to re-add some of the tunes from Dropbox, on a few of them it asked if I wanted to replace the existing version, though I had been unable to find the existing version. Hmm, now I see that another setlist is missing, one that I just created last week,. Oh, and all the keys I put in are missing. I've checked the settings - they're still set to display. Now I'll cry. I don't think I did a backup since I added them. Maybe I'll reconsider the need for them.

This would have been a major inconvenience at a gig. I want to know what I should be sure to never do again. Should I always exit the app before I close the screen? Is there a place from which I should exit? I think I have only seen that initializing thing once before, dealt with it the same way but did not seem to lose anything. 

Or when does it decide to reinitialize everything? Is that something normal?? If I had given it its half-hour, would it have fixed up everything?

Thanks.

[Zubersoft]

Wendy,

I'm really sorry to hear that you encountered those issues! Are you using the original MobileSheets (green icon) or the newer MobileSheetsPro (blue icon)? I just want to be sure I'm aware of the version you are using when offering advice. From the sounds of it, the database either had a critical problem of some kind, or was locked. When you restarted the app, the database still couldn't be started (the last instance of the program may not have been terminated by the OS yet), so MobileSheets probably tried to recover data by restoring an automatic database backup (just a guess). At that point, I would have suggested rebooting the device if you got into that kind of an error state... but both versions have an option in the settings to restore an automatic database backup. These backups are created daily, do you should have been able to restore the last known good database, which would have fixed everything. In fact, you still should be able to restore an automatic database backup from within the last week (which may be newer than the backup). Please look for this option, and let me know if you see a database backup that is fairly recent with a size that makes sense (it should be as large as or larger than the current database, which should be reflected in the last created automatic database backup in the list).

Something like this shouldn't happen in normal use, but database corruption is always possible I'm afraid. MobileSheetsPro does a better job of preventing this, as I now ship a known, stable version of SQLite with the app (this is the library that creates and interacts with the actual database file). If you did experience this problem in the newer MobileSheetsPro, then that is very concerning, as I've gone to great lengths to try to prevent data loss.

Thanks,
Mike

[Wendy Cutler]

Thanks for the reply, Mike. I have the Blue icon, Version 1.9.0. I had a backup from a few minutes ago and one from two nights ago, in the middle of the rehearsal! So I clicked that one, and in a flash, it said it was restored. Everything is there, including the keys. I wish I'd asked first before redoing stuff, but I had no idea it would be possible to get the data, never mind so easy.

[Wendy Cutler]

Mike, you said "(the last instance of the program may not have been terminated by the OS yet)".
How would I know that I'm turning off the tablet too soon?

[Zubersoft]

To be honest, the best thing to do if you are encountering this problem regularly is just to force close the app after you exit it. This is as easy as pressing the recent apps button and swiping it off the list. You may want to wait a few seconds to give the app time to gracefully close though. That should hopefully allow you to open it again immediately if needed. Otherwise you might want to wait 10-15 seconds to see if that helps if you'd rather not force kill it. It's weird that you are encountering this issue at all though... Another user just reported it happening on a chromebook, so I'm beginning to wonder if this problem is only exhibited on certain devices, or if there something I might need to change.

Mike

[Wendy Cutler]

The problem is that for me, it's so long between uses that I'd have no idea what I last did to help troubleshoot if it happens again. I'll try to make it a habit to go back to home and then remove it from the recent apps screen. It's not like it takes any time to reopen.

Ha, I didn't know the swiping thing to remove apps from that screen, just was using the X. I'm sure it's the same thing, but a new trick anyway.

[Wendy Cutler]

I just got the problem again. It's showing me that I'm still in Edit a Setlist mode. I don't remember if that's really where I left it or not. I'm still there, not sure now what "force close" means, how to do that. I did not do my own backup, yet again, but the system should have done one since Monday night, I hope. I'll do something.

[Wendy Cutler]

To be honest, the best thing to do if you are encountering this problem regularly is just to force close the app after you exit it. This is as easy as pressing the recent apps button and swiping it off the list. ...

Mike

OH, that was way better than before. The back button didn't work, but the recent apps button did, and I closed the app, then opened it again. My update from a few minutes ago is there and all the keys seem to be there. I don't know if it managed to initialize anything that has replaced what was recently there, but so far it seems fine. Thanks for the instruction in your previous note.

[sciurius]

I know it is not done to chime in at an old thread, but...

A band partner of mine encountered this problem several times, last time was saturdag when were about to start a gig. She has a Asus Zenpad Z300D and MobileSheetsPro.
Symptoms look the same: starting MSPro displays the initializing (not: loading) database message and then nothing happens.

Force stopping MSPro and restarting leads to a dialog saying that no database could be found, asking to load the backup database. This usually succeeds, and just about everything is restored. Only the last couple of changes are lost.

I know this is a hard one, and not reproducible. Consider it a "me too"...

[BRX]

Yeah, I had it a few times, too. Also with the similar problem I reported in my "how to crash msp with potential data loss".

[Zubersoft]

I wish I knew more about what is causing those problems. I hope it's not something serious like database corruption, but it's going to be hard to pinpoint without some way to reproduce it. The only way I was able to reproduce that kind of issue was by changing developer settings (as mentioned in the other thread from BRX), but that didn't cause the loss of any data, so I don't think that's really a relevant test.

Mike

[sciurius]

This may be a shot in the void, but I have seen it happening with an ASUS Zenpad and these tablets quite often run out of power quickly. I would expect the Android implementation to give apps a chance to perform a decent shutdown in this case but who can be sure?

Interesting is what happens... MSPro is started and apparently it doesn't detect a/the database. Maybe add a dialog for this case? "No database detected, shall I create a new one?".
Currently MSPro decides to initialize a new database -- which fails. My gut feeling is that maybe the low-level SQLite modules have attempted (and partially succeeded?) to open the existing database, and that the initialization instructions for the new database causes corruption or loops since things are there which shouldn't be there. This should be easily avoided.

But the main question is: why can't MSPro open the database in the first place?