Forum Discussion

AngelaIp's avatar
AngelaIp
Ideator I
2 months ago

Any best practice tips to clean up orphaned files in the Global Files Container?

Hi community,

on a regular basic I clean up orphaned files. Typically these are files that were used in a relationship or file property item.

But we have another type of files -> images and thumbnails. If thumbnails are not referenced any more, they are not marked as orphaned. They stay in the Global Files Container. We cannot use the locator to check if the files are still used.

What is the best way to get and overview of these files? 

I am already able to find orphaned thumbnails of Parts via SQL.

But I noticed that it´s dangerous to only check the "Part" Item Type. The "Image" property is used more than 30 ItemTypes. Just because my orphaned image isn´t use in a Part, doesn´t mean it isn´t use in a mpp_Tool

So I wonder if my current approach to get the files via SQL is really the best approach.

Does anyone have a better idea?

Angela

Files

4 Replies

  • AngelaIp's avatar
    AngelaIp
    Ideator I
    2 months ago

    Hi Suhas,

    thanks for the input!

    The "Delete.Orphaned.Files" Variable unfortunately doesn´t seem to work for files in the "Global Files Container" like thumbnails.

    As mentioned in the description, the Variable only applies to files in the Orphaned Files Container (=related files).

    That´s why deleting thumbnails is a super dangerous task in general. You can just go to the "Files" ItemType and delete them. BUT: You will never get any warning when they are still used somewhere. They aren´t tracked by the file locator at all.

    So the only solution I found right now is to look actively for references by SQL.

    • Suhas's avatar
      Suhas
      Ideator I
      2 months ago

      Hello AngelaIp ,

      If a file is removed from a relationship or property, and it is not associated with any other entity, file item will be automatically deleted from the system as it becomes an orphaned file.

      Regards,

      Suhas

      • AngelaIp's avatar
        AngelaIp
        Ideator I
        2 months ago

        Which Innovator version do you use?

        In I12 with (enable force delete variable!), when i create a part with a thumbnail, and then delete the Part, the file will not be removed.

        In I12, all files related to a property of type "Image" will only be stored in the Global Files Container.

        The Global Files container is also used for files that you "just" upload to innovator without any reference to a relationship or item property. Typically we have this use case for temporary files like data packages.

  • Suhas's avatar
    Suhas
    Ideator I
    2 months ago

    Hello AngelaIp ,

    I hope below solution will work for you. something may be interesting for you.

    Regards,

    Suhas