Syncing problems continue

[gzamba]

I am using tap forms on my Mac, my ipad and my iphone to sync my patients database.
I am running the latest versions on all devices (1.0.2 on the mac, 3.1 on the iphone and 3.0.3 on the iPad)
Syncing seems to be hit and miss.
The database had 93 records and I added another 14 records on the mac to bring the total to 107
at that time, the iphone app had only 87 records. After syncing the iphone app added the 14 records but kept missing the other 5 that was missing before…
The ipad app synced fine, but when I add records to the ipad they are not synced back to the mac!!! SO now the iPad has 108 records and the mac only 107…
I tried doing a “reset icloud sync” but that did not work.
I tried uninstalling the app on the iphone, but since reinstalling it, I cannot get the sync to work anymore on the iphone. The form is missing and so are the records…
I do not now if this has any significance, but I have encrypted the database on the mac and ipad.
I tried setting the same encryption key on the iphone as well, but that did not seem to help.

my ipad sees both itself and the iphone as registered devices, the iphone sees only itself, and the mac sees itself and the iphone.

WHAT A MESS!

please help

[gzamba]

I installed v1.1 on the mac, and took the iphone out of the loop to make things simpler, but it still does not work…
I did a manual push on the mac after reseting the sync and after two hours there is no progress…
Changes on the mac have not been moved to the iPad or vice versa for that mater…
The ipad sees both itself and the mac, but the mac only sees itself as a registered device

Go figure!

[Brendan]

Hello Gzamba,

If the Mac only sees itself that means something isn’t setup right in your iCloud settings. Are you using the same iCloud account on both devices?

Also, take a look at this folder on your Mac:

~/Library/Mobile Documents/FXLPHZS84D~com~clickspace~tapforms/SyncDocuments

Do you see one TFSyncDevice file there per device? If you have your Mac and iPad enabled for iCloud sync in Tap Forms, then you should see 2 files there.

If not, then something else is causing iCloud not to sync the files.

Then, every time you click on the sync button, you will see a new TFSyncDoc file appear. There should always be one that ends with [0] for each device. If you have one that starts at [1] but has no [0] version of it, then you’ll need to tap the Reset iCloud Sync button again on your iPad to get syncing back to the beginning again.

Let me know what you discover.

Thanks,

Brendan

[gzamba]

I see 4 files in there
TFSyncDevice-4DBAF815-55F4-4266-95FB-AF61B315C66D.tfs
TFSyncDoc-4DBAF815-55F4-4266-95FB-AF61B315C66D-[1].tfx
TFSyncDoc-AF1B40EF-7CCD-4A1D-8EA4-0F0162348F89-[0].tfx
TFSyncDoc-AF1B40EF-7CCD-4A1D-8EA4-0F0162348F89-[1].tfx

I tried reseting the icloud sync again, but nothing happened.
the four files disappeared and then they reappeared.

Is there something else I could do on the mac end to reset the iCloud sync?

[gzamba]

I re-enabled syncing on the iphone and now the situation is like this
the iphone sees itself and the mac
the ipad sees all three
the mac sees only itself!!!!!!

and
~/Library/Mobile Documents/FXLPHZS84D~com~clickspace~tapforms/SyncDocuments
has the following files
TFSyncDevice-4DBAF815-55F4-4266-95FB-AF61B315C66D.tfs
TFSyncDevice-40F5FE0D-10CA-4624-A730-F1EB05F1A7EA.tfs
TFSyncDoc-4DBAF815-55F4-4266-95FB-AF61B315C66D-[0].tfx
TFSyncDoc-AF1B40EF-7CCD-4A1D-8EA4-0F0162348F89-[0].tfx
TFSyncDoc-AF1B40EF-7CCD-4A1D-8EA4-0F0162348F89-[1].tfx

my guess is the second device is the iphone, but my question is this
If the device is present in this folder, then this means that it has been registered. Right?
so why does it not appear in the registered devices of the mac tap forms application?

Maybe there is something wrong with the mac app?

UPDATE
After doing a manual push on the mac, the iphone suddenly appeared on the registered devices list on the mac

Still no sign of the iPad though…

[gzamba]

I uninstalled the ipad app, and then reinstalled it.
after re-enabilng icloud sync, syncing between all three devices started working again.
The only problem is that I have lost some 8-10 entries I had made on the iPad…

[Brendan]

Hello Gzamba,

I’m sorry for your lost records. If you delete an app from an iOS device, all its data is deleted along with it.

It just takes time for the iCloud services to propagate all the files to all of the devices. For example, when your iPad didn’t show up in the list of TFSyncDevice files, it meant that the operating system hadn’t synced its registration file. If your iPad showed 3 devices and your other devices showed only 2 devices, then that’s what’s happening. The iPad would have created the TFSyncDevice file in that folder, but on the iPad. It’s up to the operating system to then copy that file to all the other devices. That part is outside of Tap Forms’ control. The file would have eventually appeared on your Mac. It could have been 5 minutes later or 2 hours later. It’s really up to iCloud at that point. Although generally it happens fairly quickly, I’ve seen delays like that before.

I was always scratching my head during developing wondering if I was doing something wrong in my coding, but I came to the realization that iCloud can just be slow at syncing sometimes. And these kinds of things make it appear that Tap Forms isn’t syncing because it’s relying on the operating system to sync those files. Now there is one bug that I know about in the list of registered devices on the Mac. If you leave the popover open, it won’t always refresh the list when you add new devices. You need to close the popover and open it again to see the refreshed list. But that’s only in the case where you see more TFSyncDevice files in the Finder than you see devices listed in the iCloud Sync popover in Tap Forms.

I’m glad sync is working for you now though.

Thanks,

Brendan

[Author]

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