two copies of Retrospect launched by RetroRun

[mbizer 0]

I'm dumbfounded. For the past week or so, I'm seeing 2 copies of Retrospect launched by RetroRun. I deleted RetroRun and had Retrospect regenerate it, to no avail.

 

Has anyone seen this situation, and can you propose a solution?

[CallMeDave 7]

There have been other reports on the Forum about this (did you search before posting?), but most of them included too little information to help anyone recreate the issue.

 

Add yours to that list.

 

Perhaps providing things such as the version of Retrospect, the version of Mac OS X, etc etc etc would contribute to the body of knowledge...

 

Dave

[mbizer 0]

Quote:

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There have been other reports on the Forum about this (did you search before posting?)

 

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I did, but search results often depend on how one phrases the search

 

 

Quote:

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Perhaps providing things such as the version of Retrospect, the version of Mac OS X, etc etc etc would contribute to the body of knowledge..

 

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Retrospect 6.0.204, MacOS X 10.3.8 (7U16), PowerBook G4/867.

 

What else would you like to know?

[natew 0]

Hi

 

One basic thing to check is that there are no other copies of Retrospect in the garbage or elsewhere on the disk.

 

Thanks

Nate

[mbizer 0]

What is the difference between RetroRun and RetroRunSL? They're both running.

[natew 0]

Hi

 

I don't know many details but this is normal.

 

Thanks

Nate

[mbizer 0]

One thing I've noted is that the problem appears to be related to *one* backup script.

[CallMeDave 7]

Quote:

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One thing I've noted is that the problem appears to be related to *one* backup script.

 

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This is the first time anyone has posted an observation (or gut feeling) such as this.

 

- Can you describe this script?

- Can you contrast and compare this script in relation to the other scripts you have (that run normally)?

[mbizer 0]

It's weird. Both reference afp volumes. Here is a snapshot of the script that launches only one copy of Retrospect:

 

 

And here is a snapshot of the script that launches two copies:

 

[CallMeDave 7]

Does the first script always work correctly, and does the second script always cause the problem?

 

If you were to change _one_ thing at a time on the working script, can you get it to misbehave?

 

For example, if you changed the Destination in the first Script to use the same Backup Set as the second, will it launch two? (you could cancel the backup before it actually starts, so you don't write files you don't want in that Backup Set).

 

How about if you changed the Source to look at the whole "Gigas" volume, instead of the subvolume referenced in the first script?

 

This is not a direction my Gut Feeling would have taken for this, as I'd figure that the specifics of a script only come into play _after_ Retrospect has launched. If you are able to isolate this behavior to a script's settings, that would probably go a long way towards discovering what's going on.

 

Dave

[mbizer 0]

I have a couple of questions: where the #$%^&* is Dantz tech support? Is there no response from the company unless one pays for the annual contract? If we figured out the problem, would it really matter? I've really never seen a company like this.

[twickland 69]

Quote:

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I think I have reproduced this. We are working on it.

 

Thanks

Nate

 

 

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The above was posted on 2/21/05 in another thread in this forum on the 2 copies problem. Oddly, NateW doesn't refer to it above. Nate, what was the outcome?

 

I usually leave the Retrospect app running and allow it only to autorun scripts. Not always, but a couple of times when I failed to do this, I too got two dock icons, two copies of the app running, etc. after autolaunch, as described above.

 

(Retrospect 6.0.204, Driver Update 6.2.102, OS 10.3.9, G4 Dual 450.)

[mbizer 0]

What is normal?

[natew 0]

Hi

 

This is still under investigation. I don't have much more info than that. It appears this isn't as cut and dried an issue as we would hope. I'll let you know if there is any progress on this.

 

Thanks

Nate

[mbizer 0]

The problem has disappeared from my machine, for no discernible reason.

[CallMeDave 7]

I for one am happy to hear that it's been observed by Dantz. The reports of this behavior started with the release of 5.1, and this is the first word from a Moderator that it's being investigated.

 

Best,

 

David

[kvrousseau 0]

Nate et al:

 

Just to throw in my 2 cents' worth. I observe this problem running on an 867 MHz Quicksilver G4 running 10.3.9. I also observed it running 10.3.8. It started when I upgraded to version 6 from version 5. Also, I moved my backup machine from an ancient G3 running version 5 to the current machine, and upgraded to 6 at the same time, so I can't disentangle those two changes.

 

I am running 6.0.204, with driver update 6.1.102. I run one nightly backup script, with any of 3 rotating series of tape backups. The problem occurs roughly 20-30% of the nights the backups run, and roughly once a month my Retro.Config file is damaged to the point I need to trash the old one and pull the most recent un-damaged one off the backup tapes.

 

Needless to say, this is getting old, and I am pretty concerned about either losing data, or ending up with Config/catalog corruption so bad I need to start from scratch.

 

I'll look forward to any substantive response or fixes. :-)

 

Thanks,

 

Ken

[mbizer 0]

Quote:

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The problem occurs roughly 20-30% of the nights the backups run, and roughly once a month my Retro.Config file is damaged to the point I need to trash the old one and pull the most recent un-damaged one off the backup tapes.

 

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It is a bad problem. I hope it gets fixed soon.

[NeilFaiman 0]

I also see this behavior, maybe twice a week. I'm running Retrospect 6.0.212 with driver access version 1.1.106, driver update version 6.5.102. Mac OS X 10.4.2 on a Dual G5/2.5. I do a nightly backup that does

 

- a normal (incremental) backups of my /Users directory to a file backup set on a partition on a second internal HD

 

- a normal (incremental) backups of my /Users directory to a file backup set on a partition on a FireWire LaCie d2

 

- a duplicate of my entire hard drive, either to a separate partition on my second internal drive or to a separate partition on my LaCie (alternating nights)

 

Here's the beginning of the log from my backups last night:

 

? Retrospect version 6.0.212

automatically launched at 8/7/2005 2:00 AM

 

? Retrospect version 6.0.212

automatically launched at 8/7/2005 2:00 AM

+ Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.5.102

+ Retrospect Driver Update, version 6.5.102

 

+ Normal backup using Local Archive at 8/7/2005 2:00 AM

To backup set Indira…

 

- 8/7/2005 2:00:32 AM: Copying Futura…

 

+ Normal backup using Local Archive at 8/7/2005 2:00 AM

Can't add to backup set Indira: The catalog is locked.

8/7/2005 2:00:32 AM: Execution incomplete.

 

I just checked activity monitor, and I only have one RetroRun running.

[CallMeDave 7]

This has been reported before here on the Forum. There is always a "catalog locked" error.

 

There was one hint from NateW that they'd reproduced it, but nothing more was said.

 

All indication point to the fact that it's the same on-disk copy of Retrospect that is double-running and not some rogue copy of the program in another location.

 

I'd suggest searching the Forum for earlier threads on the subject.

 

Dave

[shadowspawn 0]

Note that a likely work-around is to leave Retrospect running (as Twickland mentioned). I do this on my home machine, I got into the habit when there were issues with Retrospect launching from the login screen.

 

I have only ever seen the two-retrospects issue twice, from times I did not have Retrospect already running, once today! The only scripts I use are backup server scripts.

 

Retrospect 6.0.212, only scheduled script is a Backup Server script.

 

Just confirming that I have a single RetroRun, and it is the same copy of Retrospect running.

 

[Thumper:~] john% ps -auxwww | grep Retro

root 1401 1.0 2.2 91940 19988 ?? S 2:57AM 50:34.37 /System/Library/Frameworks/Carbon.framework/Versions/A/Support/LaunchCFMApp /Applications/Retrospect 6.0/Retrospect/Contents/MacOS/Retrospect

root 1403 0.0 2.6 113540 23924 ?? S 2:57AM 47:53.51 /System/Library/Frameworks/Carbon.framework/Versions/A/Support/LaunchCFMApp /Applications/Retrospect 6.0/Retrospect/Contents/MacOS/Retrospect

root 1425 0.0 0.0 28588 208 ?? Ss 2:57AM 0:06.75 /Library/StartupItems/RetroRun/RetroRun

john 1791 0.0 0.0 27384 436 p1 S+ 10:56AM 0:00.01 grep Retro

[shadowspawn 0]

For reference, these other two threads cover the same issue:

2 copies of Retrospect started by scheduler

Scripted backup complains about locked files

 

jwarthman observed there: I have a bit more information. I have observed that, for me, this problem ONLY happens the first time Retrospect runs a scheduled backup after the Mac is restarted.

 

This was the case for me too, but I have so few observations points that it is scarcely a confirmation. Can some of the people having a repeatable problem confirm whether they ever see the problem after the first launch following a restart?

 

(mbizer in this thread only sees the issue with one script, which is a surprising development!)