Load Macro File

[stevecasper]

Home Network: Steve's PC and Tammy's laptop.

 

Steve's PC: ME 3.7d and MEP

Tammy's Laptop: ME 3.7d and MEP

 

Until very recently, my wife only had ME3 on her laptop. I found I was able to set my ME3 back-up to save to our shared "Public" folder, and then when she (re)launches ME3, she has a scheduled macro that Loads Macro File from my backup.

 

This makes it so that if I tweak or add macros on my computer, it basically ensures that her macros will update as well, so if I find myself working on her laptop, I don't have to suffer through doing things manually, or setting up the same macro all over again.

 

Now circumstances have arisen where I no longer need my MEP license at work, so I've set it up on Tammy's laptop. I've tried to duplicate my set-up so that I can benefit from MEP on both machines (which is what I would prefer to do anyway). However, MEP doesn't seem to work in the same fashion.

 

When I tried saving my back-up files to the shared "Public" folder, it saves the back-up as a .000, which is relatively useless. If I try opening that file with my wife's MEP, the application comes to a near stand-still. Terminating and restarting the program doesn't help. I had to do a complete reinstall and try another tactic.

 

My second attempt, I renamed the .000 to .mex. Same results.

 

My final solution was to export every macro on my MEP to the "Public" folder, and then import it on the laptop. This is less-than-ideal in a number of respects:

1. Any time I tweak a macro on my PC, I'll have to re-export/import that specific macro for it to do me any good.
   
2. I lost all my categories. Even though I checked the box to save them, the categories were lost upon importing the macro file.
   
3. I'm sure there are other factors making it less-than-ideal, but those two are sufficient for me right now.
   

My hope is for somebody here who has done something similar, or who has some experience with this particularity, to help me find a way to make this a little more stream-lined and easier. The way it is in ME3. It doesn't have to be exactly the same way it was in ME3. In fact, I welcome improvements. The bottom-line is that the way it worked in ME3 was great, and I can't think of how to do it in MEP all by myself.

 

Thanks for any help!

[Cory]

My advice: Don't mess with backups....................................................................

What you are suggesting should work so that implies something is haywire with your setup. To confirm I just backup up my CJ2.MEX and renamed the 000 file to CJ2backup.MEX. It opened just fine and instantly.

 

What I don't understand is why you're messing with the backup file. Why not just open the same MEX? I have dozens of machines that all operate off of the same MEX file and as soon as I make a change they all have it distributed to them in a minimum of 10 minutes. And even if you wanted to make a local copy you can still perform file operations to copy and even overwrite an open MEX file.

 

2¢: I disable the auto backup on all machines. Causes problems at shutdown and buries my changes to quick. Also I can’t find jack in them. Instead I have a macro that copies the live file to a subdir called “Backup”. With a date stamped file name and all are MEX. Additionally it prompts me for what I changed and keeps track of all the versions in a log file in the same folder. Simple to implement and much more useful and I only make backups for significant changes. I have a similar macro for clients where I work on a development copy. I keep my macros portable and the convention is I keep the development copy in a subfolder called "dev" which is a mirror of the live folder with all its support files. When I have designed a new macro or made revisions and they are ready for prime time I execute the macro and it pushes the dev copy over the active copy and does the backup routine I mentioned above. Works slick!