Shareaza 2.3.0.0 wont display download list

[cvco]

I have 2.3.0.0, XP and a new router. Everything was OK during a prior Shareaza session and the next time i launched it, the download list, that being the contents of the Incomplete folder, wouldnt display. I checked settings for the location of the folder, and every other setting. I uninstalled the program, installed 2.2.5.0, 2.4.0.0 and even 2.3.0.0 again and still the Download list wont display.

I tried searching for new files for download and those both download and display on the list, but not anything from the Incomplete folder.

In the past, this happened and all it took was 2-3 times quitting and re-launching Shareaza and the program would find the folder and display (and continue downloading) the list. But it wont now.

In one of the program installs this week, i did see a message that didnt have permission to access the Complete and Incomplete folders. I checked firewall settings and anything i could find to adjust by way of PC permissions. I also made new folders and transferred the Complete/Incomplete contents there and made sure Shareaza settings pointed to the new folders. The message about permissions no longer appeared but still the Download list wont display. I know there wasnt a corruption of all the Incomplete data and nothing on the PC had changed between sessions. Whats wrong?

[kevogod]

Shareaza 2.5.3.0 Download

[cvco]

I dont see the relationship of my problem to installing 2.5.XX but i did it anyway and still the Download pane is empty, it wont display contents of the Incomplete folder or continue downloading the items.

[ailurophobe]

No idea on the actual problem, but if Shareaza just lost the old downloads but handles new ones normally, the easiest way would probably be to restart you downloads from zero thru search or a link and then do a merge with the old partials you thoughtfully first moved somewhere else. I think you might have to rename them to have the correct extension, but I might remember wrong.

But if this happens often, it is probably caused by something on your system. File/folder permissions or anti-virus would be my first guesses since those have an obvious capability to hide files from Shareaza. And anti-virus is always updating and changing how it works without users really noticing. If you were on a newer version of Windows I'd add User Access Control to the list, since that also seems to randomly make things not work for reasons known only to the good people at Microsoft.

[old_death]

[cvco]

Thats very good advice and i tried it already and it doesnt work.

What i did was clear out the old partials and start 10 new downloads for which had tons of users online. All the downloads began racing to the Partial folder. After about 10% complete, i closed Shareaza and put the old partials back into the new partial folder and restarted the program. Then, none of the old partials appear in the list and the new partials all show PENDING and refused to continue downloading. Only 2-3 minutes had passed, i could not possibly have lost all the uploading users i had 3 minutes before.

I also tried taking out/trying/putting back the Metadata Folder and still same results.

In the past this problem always solved itself by simply restarting the program a few times. But not now. I wouldnt care but i have about 70 partials which after some years some are only at 80% complete. For some very large files i can only get about 1mb per week and i'd hate to start over from scratch. And at this moment i dont even remember all of them.

What now?

[old_death]

No, don't put the old partials back into the folder, but go to the advanced download properties and use the option to merge the downloads with a local file. Then select the old partials and their content will be added to the newly added downloads.

[cvco]

Dumb mean to sound dumb but where is "advanced download properties"? In Shareaza Advanced settings there is nothing there to help, same true if right-clicking the partial folder and looking under Properties. I get your meaning I just dont see where to do it.

[ailurophobe]

It is in Properties/Actions for the downloads right-click menu. You only need to wait until Shareaza downloads the hashset for the file and no longer shows the "(no hashset)".

[old_death]

In the download window, richt-click at a download and select "properties".

[cvco]

Ok i understand and i tried to do that but you must merge the new download with a FILE, not a FOLDER, so i cant select the Partial folder as a place to merge to.

This doesnt make any sense. Isnt there a way to force Shareaza to recognize its own Partial Folder? I get what you said but the method doesnt work.

By the way, the Completed Folder is not a problem and users can freely download from it.

[old_death]

You must merge every download with its partial file. As you have moved your .partial files to an other folder before restarting your downloads, you can simply select the .partial file by its name (the name is one of the hashes that is shown in the properties dialog of the restarted download).

[ailurophobe]

Merge could probably use some UI and convenience improvements. It has turned out to be much more useful than I thought it would be when it was added.

[old_death]

True, maybe we should add an auto-recognition for a folder containing old partial files that can be merged into the current downloads.

[cvco]

[loopyloo]

Your Incomplete files are lost to Shareaza. It no longer recognises them. This happens from time to time when something like a major crash happens or something to cause shareaza to lose some of it's data it needs to work with. You need to do this procedure to recover them. Simply placing them back in the incomplete folder will not work.

First, with Shareaza closed, locate your Incomplete folder. On winXP it is most likely (C:\Program Files\Shareaza\Incomplete).Or on Win7 it would be something like (C:\Users\(your username)\AppData\Local\Shareaza\Incomplete).On Vista I am unsure, but the folder location may be similar to Win7. Note: AppData is a hidden folder. You will need to enable viewing of hidden folders & files in your folder and search options to see it.
Next Rename your Incomplete folder to "FailedIncomplete"(or any name). Then make a new folder in the same location called "Incomplete"(this is the new Incomplete folder). After this start shareaza. You will have no downloads in your shareaza download queue(if your doing this then there probably wasn't anyway). Now you need to restart your old downloads from scratch.. that is by finding the exact same file and starting it downloading all over again. Most likely you'll need to search for the files..or if your lucky you started them from a web link and it should be fairly easy to find them again. It HAS to be the exact file as your old download.
Once you have the file started you need to wait for the file to find at least one source and to receive a trusted hash set from a source that already has the file.
Next you need to view the new files Properties window. You do this by selecting the file and clicking the Properties button on the bottom edge of the download window or by right clicking the file and selecting Properties from the drop down menu. If you do not see the properties button or properties in the menu you need to change to Advanced Mode(Called "Power Mode" in the "view" menu) to recover your downloads.
In the Properties window you will see the files hashes(Sha1,ED2K,etc) and some other advanced options. Write down the Hashes for the File. You will need these.
Next Look for an option that says "Merge with local file and verify"(This may, depending on shareaza version, be on a second Tab of the same window called "Actions"). Click this option. This brings up a file browser window with which to browse your computer. Find your old failed Incomplete folder.
Ok. Now you need to do a little investigative work. Find the file in the failed Incomplete folder that contains one of the Hashes(Sha1,ED2k,Tiger-Root,etc) for the file you are attempting to recover.(It could be its Sha1 hash, its ED2K Hash or any of the other hashes). There will most likely be 2 files with the same hash as the file you are recovering. One is an SD file (.sd) and the other is the actual partial file. The extention of the partial file is ".partial", This is the file you want, not the SD file. Partial files are usually the larger of the 2 files. If the Hash and the filename of the incomplete file are the same then it is the right file.Once you have found the correct partial file select it and press the "Open" button. This will start the old partial file being merged into the new partial file in the new Incomplete folder. Press "OK" to exit the Properties window.
Your file will take a few minutes depending on size to merge into the new partial. You should see the file grow more complete as data is merged and verified. The progress bar may fluctuate up and down a bit, but this is normal. You can see it's progress by mousing over it and looking at the tooltip.
Once the file has finished it's recovery you may repeat the process with the next file you wish to recover.

If you can't find the exact same file again to redownload or you find the file but cannot get enough sources to get a trusted hash then I know of no way to recover the file. In the case of sources you may need to have patience.

This is a guide from the start of the process. You may need to undo a few things and work out where to start from in your case Cvco. But I hope this helps.

[cvco]

Thanks very much for the time you took for that reply. I will try your method although im sick at the thought of losing 75%, 88%, 96% downloads that took months and even years to get that much of.

Meantime i didnt have any crash in Vista or the program, i only closed it and then eventually shutdown the PC. Next time i launched Shareaza, the download queue was empty. That never happened in many years of using shareaza. Previously, when i re-installed or installed later versions, sometimes the queue wouldnt display but after 2-3 re-launchings, it would.

So in a way we can say there is an ongoing weakness in the program in this regard--the ability to recognize and use the Incomplete/Complete folders. Other functions remain normal.