MacGourmet News

A lot of this information is in the user guide, specifically in the appendix at the end, but because I know a lot of people don't read documentation, I thought I'd take this time to post some useful information here about your MacGourmet library.

Your library is stored in a database file named MacGourmetDatabase and this file has a file extension of .mgdatabase. This file is located in the folder you specified the first time you ran MacGourmet or when you upgraded from a version 1 library. Normally this location is your Documents folder, so in your Documents folder there should be a file named MacGourmetDatabase.mgdatabase. This file contains all of your data, including your recipes, images, etc. You can't import this file using File > "Import..." in the application. Import is intended for importing files from other applications, and files you have explicitly exported from MacGourmet (.mgourmet files).

You should never move this file, ESPECIALLY while the application is running. You can't open the database file by double-clicking on it (well you sort of can, in that MacGourmet will start up, but this isn't recommended). MacGourmet expects the database to always be in the same location, and it always loads it when it starts up. If for some reason you do want to move it, you should make a copy of your database in the new location, make sure the file is named correctly, and change the database location in Preferences > Advanced. If for some reason you start MacGourmet and it can't find your database file when it should find it, you should choose the Quit option and contact support. There are so many checks and data safeguards in the product though, that this should never happen.

When you upgrade MacGourmet, you should never have to do anything to your database file. All you need to do is copy the new version of MacGourmet to your hard drive (usually your Applications folder) replacing the existing version. That's it.

You should backup your MacGourmetDatabase file often. You should at the very least make a copy of this file somewhere once in a while, especially after you've made a lot of changes. It's best to do an "off machine" backup though, to say .Mac or a CD or external backup drive. You'd be amazed at how many people have their hard drives fail on them (I know because they write to ask for their serial number, which BTW you can get by going to the online store and entering your email address). You can also have your computer stolen, even from your home (it's actually happened to me). So if you can make a copy that is stored on something other than your drive, your data will be that much safer (Go ahead, make a backup now if you haven't lately).

Some people have also asked about files found by Spotlight in Library/MacGourmet/MetaData. These files are purely there so that Spotlight can find recipes in your database. These are not your recipes though. They are index files that point to recipes in your database.

Finally, there is a way to open a database other than your normal, default database. You can do this by holding down the option key on your keyboard when MacGourmet is starting up. When you do this, you will be given the option to choose a database file. This is useful for me during development and testing, but it can also be used to, for example, open a backup copy of your database, or a database you create for a specific purpose (for instance, testing a bunch of imports). How do you make another database? Well the easiest way is to make a copy of your current database, and rename the copy, say from MacGourmetDatabase.mgdatabase to MyTestDatabase.mgdatabase (note you MUST have a .mgdatabase file extension).

There you have it, some in-depth information on your MacGourmet library. Hopefully you found this information useful.

Labels: Helpful Hints