Trotec JobControl 9.4.4.2 lost material settings

[Ronald Erickson]

Today I fired up the laser and JobControl 9.4.4.2 lost all my custom materials settings. The custom categories are listed, but the settings for the materials under any given category are blank. I don't have a current backup of the TR_CO2_Material.dat file that contains my material settings that I can restore (the previous backup has the same issue).

Any known issues with JobControl spontaneously dumping the custom materials? It appears the file itself is corrupted... if I delete a material file that DOES list, it will jump to another material that does not work if you directly select it WITH the settings intact! I've written down all the settings I can indirectly access. It also appears that it has dumped the default Wood category with Birch, Cedar, etc subcategories directly into the main categories. (aka, Wood... Birch is now listed with Birch as a top level category and the Wood top level category is gone)

I've started a notebook journal with my settings, something I probably should have done in the first place. I think I'll delete the software entirely and set it up fresh.

Very frusterating.

[Mike Null]

Ron

I haven't had that happen. I'm guessing that it is a computer issue but you should get them back if you re-install Job Control.

After you do that you can keep a copy of your settings in another location. You will acquire new settings when you update Job Control as I recall.

[Ronald Erickson]

Reinstalling did bring everything back to factory defaults, but it's not the factory settings that I was concerned about losing; It was all the custom material settings that went poof. It's crazy that all the settings were stored in a hidden single binary file... I have an idea when the corruption happened though. It was when I was trying to create a new material group. The software went into a loop saying it was an invalid group name, but wouldn't let me actually correct it and just kept saying it was invalid. I find creating materials very frusterating in JobControl 9.4.4.2.

By "update Job Control", do you mean update to JobControl X? Is JobControl X out now officially? I had asked the question if it would be Free or Fee in the Trotec Users Group but it never received a response. Should I contact my sales rep for a copy or do I need to call Trotec?

[Mike Null]

The newest version is still in Beta testing as I understand so I think you're up to date. You can save that materials file separately with yours and their settings. i would advise doing that.

I think you'll find the material files under programs, Trotec, common. But to be sure check with tech support.

[Ronald Erickson]

C:\ProgramData\Trotec\JobControl\9.4.4\TR_CO2_Mate rial.dat is where I found the materials file. (The ProgramData folder is hidden by default so you have to have "show hidden files and folders" enabled.

It doesn't appear to use a separate file for my custom settings vs. the factory settings and I cannot figure out a way to use a custom materials file. I'll have to explore if there is a way to separate the two... Maybe it says something JobControl manual somewhere. At the very least I'll keep a backup of the one in cast the file corrupts again.

Thanks Mike.

[Gene Howard]

JobControl does store the entire material database in that single .dat file. At my job I have that file backed up from both production engraving computers every 3 hours if any changes have occurred, it's saved us from both computer and human error many times over. You can easily use something free like Cobian Backup to schedule backup based on either time, file attribute change(s), or a combination of the two.

I was recently in contact with Trotec regarding JobControl X, since we're very interested in some of the new features like turning links on/off per material and a big revamp to the material database structure (probably preventing your very issue!). Last I heard JobControl X is currently only available for the Speedy 400, support for the Speedy 300, 100, etc. is "coming", never got an answer for our Speedy II. Upgrade cost from 9.4.x is $200 / license.