Stupip/Funny question about boot drives

The Event/Project folders would have to be in root, not User > Movies.

If FCPX had a system in place just like their SAN Locations but for regular drives, it would be 1,000 times less stupid.

;)

Jeremy

I like to say I was half right! ;)

Yes, I meant having other drives as the scratch drives.

Hmm,

I think events/projects must be on local (direct attached) volumes either ejectable or not. A network volume won't work regardless of the structure - except SAN. For NAS or other machines connected to your computer you need to work with sparse disk images.

The scenario I described obviously only works convenient with sparse disk images. 10.7 up also would allow to "auto-mount" them at boot time.
You also have to make sure that the root structure doesn't contain any folder name like "VIDEO" or "DCIM" or anything that makes FCPX to think "Hey, that could be a cam card".

As said with my examples, if I need to boot from disk 1 the events/projects on this disk need to be in "~/Movies/" but they will be in "/Final Cut Events" and "/Final Cut Projects" because they where created when using another boot drive. So I have to move them to "~/Movies". When have to boot from another drive I have to move them back to the root level - as long I want to make them visible for FCPX.
That's how it works and there is no other way to make it work.

@ Jeremy: Okay I agree, you where half right ;)

Andreas

Spherico
http://www.spherico.com/filmtools

Bill-

That's not Andreas's issue.

Jeremy

Rich,

First of all it's not possible and recommended that two people work at the same time on the same project.

You can take the route to exchange portable drives - this is the most simple approach.

Another approach is to create sparse disk images on either of the machines or on both.
As long the machines are connected the sparse disk can be mounted on any of the two machines. So create a sparse disk image and put event and projects there. You will have access from both machines (or any machine in the network).

Using an NAS will require the same procedure since FCPX won't see the required structure on any network attached volume. But if you got enough money you can use a SAN.

I created a little app which helps to create and handle sparse disk images with ease. It's free.
http://www.spherico.com/filmtools/createDiskImage/index.html

You also can create them using Disk Utility and Terminal in case you want to modify them.

Andreas

Spherico
http://www.spherico.com/filmtools

Yes any student can have his own sparse disk anywhere in the network.

But working with sparse disks need some understanding.
First a sparse disk image is a kind of "virtual volume" located on a another volume as a file. If you double click that file it will show up in the Finder as a new volume which can be used like any other volume directly attached to the local machine. Like any other volume it will have it's limitation in size.
For example you got a 2 TB internal drive and you want to create some sparse disk images on it. What you can do is to create 3 500GB sparse disk images leaving 500G free for the OS, apps etc. Once the 3 sparse disk file are created they only cover a small amount of disk space - cause they are empty when you created them. Now working with them will let them grow (regarding used space). If you add more files to the internal (or external) drive will leave less space for the sparse disk images to grow to their limit maybe. Therefore the 500GB in some circumstances can't grow up to 500GB cause there is not enough space on the "master volume".
The other thing is that once the sparse volume grow up in size it will keep this size. You can delete files on the sparse volume but the current space used for this will keep the same coverage. You can shrink them using some terminal commands (or my app).
The other thing is that the 500GB (in my example) is not enough to hold a certain project and FCPX will give you an error. This can be fixed - as long there's enough available space on the "master volume" - by some terminal commands as well (or with my app with a click).

So go and try some some of the scenarios before you start and make sure the students understand what they do and can do.

Andreas

Spherico
http://www.spherico.com/filmtools

[Richard Herd] "Last note: I've ordered Bill's software rec in his signature."

Thank you!

We're in quite a few seats in quite a few schools.

Any questions just drop me a note.

Bill

Know someone who teaches video editing in elementary school, high school or college? Tell them to check out http://www.StartEditingNow.com - video editing curriculum complete with licensed practice content.