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Best Practices
This section contains a selection of best practices for the usage of the RDMS. Following these best practices will help to get the most optimal RDMS user experience.
The section will be gradually extended with new usage examples and tips.
If you feel that an important information should be added to this section, feel free to contact RDMS support with your request!
Data Naming
For the optimal usage of the RDMS, it is highly recommended to follow these best practices for naming your files/folders:
- Do not use special characters (e.g.
$%^*&#=!
) in your file/folder names. - Do not use periods (
.
) in your file/folder names. - Do not use quote symbols (
'
or“
) in your file/folder names. - Prefer usage of underscore (
_
) or hyphen (-
) instead of white spaces in file/folder names.
Example of a folder structure with good naming:
$ itree project_name project_name analytical_data machine_01 20231223_analysis.ext 20240111_analysis.ext 20240325_analysis.ext machine_02 20230222_analysis.ext 20230710_analysis.ext 20240109_analysis.ext machine_03 20231020_analysis.ext 20231120_analysis.ext 20231212_analysis.ext manuscripts publication_v01.odt
Example of a folder structure with wrong/difficult naming:
$ itree "Project with XXX and YYY" Project with XXX and YYY analytical_data analytical devices @ building 1 experiment 100% scan rate.ext experiment 74% scan rate.ext experiment 80% scan rate.ext analytical devices @ building 2 Experiment 01 by user.name@rug.nl.ext Experiment 02 by user.name@rug.nl.ext Experiment 03 by user.name@rug.nl.ext analytical devices @ building 3 $1-100%.ext Versuch #1.ext Versuch_Öldiffusion_erste_Möglichkeit.ext manuscripts publication.final version.odt
Detecting Corrupt Files
In rare cases, it can happen that data arrives in a non-finalized form in the RDMS. These usually happens if a data transfer suddenly drops out, for example due to connection problems, while the system did not finalize it properly.
Restarting the data transfer can solve this issue, but it can also happen that the already transferred data is kept in a locked state which results in problems when the transfer is restarted as those files cannot be overwritten directly.
If you experience these issues, it is normally recommended to contact RDMS-Support.
Users of the command-line tool `iCommands` have furthermore the possibility to detect such locked files directly via an appropriate CLI command.
In general, these issues manifest in HIERARCHY_ERRORs
when a data transfer to the RDMS (e.g. via iput
or irsync
) is tried via CLI.
To check all files at a RDMS location /rug/home/path/to/collection
including all its subfolders, and to detect just those files that are marked as locked, the following command can be executed:
$ iquest "status: %s, name: %s/%s" "SELECT DATA_REPL_STATUS, COLL_NAME, DATA_NAME WHERE COLL_NAME LIKE '/rug/home/path/to/folder%' AND DATA_REPL_STATUS > '1'"
These command will check the specified location for files which have a replica status of 2 (“read-locked”) or 3 (“write-locked”), and then output it in the format:
status: <2/3>. name: <path_to_folder>/<name_of_file> ---
While the locked files cannot be directly removed, they can still be moved first to another location in the your home/team location, for example a separate folder for locked files. Afterwards, the data transfer can be restarted.