Summary
A feature to clean up the old files leftover from deleting or saving .urp files.
What is it?
When a user deletes either *.urp or *.installation files the *.txt, *.script, and *.variables files are still present on the controller.
Another issue is that it appears as though Polyscope creates a new backup file every time you save a .urp file. The files have an extension of old1, old2, old3 etc. There can be hundreds of these files.
This feature would make it easier for users to keep the file space in Polyscope clean and manageable.
Why is it needed?
To clean up the old and unused files. In Polyscope there is no way to a) select multiple files at once to delete and b) view the date the file was modified.
In my opinion, polyscope does a terrible job of file management. Like @fuknrekd alluded to, anytime you move a URP or rename it, there are artifacts left behind that consume a large amount of space.
I also don’t understand the .old files since there doesn’t appear to be anyway to rollback a program. Are the old files there for the undo funciton?
UR needs to improve this because over time these artifacts consume a large amount of space. This can bite you during a UR Software Update if there is not enough room on the SD card to perform the update - resulting in hard fail. I had this happen to me.
But either way, this is not clean and if you are trying to maintain a remote backup of files this makes it difficult.
Ok, seriously. What the hell is going on here. This is getting out of hand.
This isn’t just a mess, it’s causing performance issues. It’s causing eye strain issues. It’s causing the frickin’ moon to be out of faze causing massive tidal waves that are drowning my cobots.
Just letting you all know that we are seeing this and I have forwarded this thread to Product Management so we can consider how we can fix it…except the moon-phase issue described by @fuknrekd. For that, we will have to vastly increase the payload of our cobots. It’s simple math, really…
Every time I add a new program (more like copy an existing one to modify into a new one) I seem to get more slowdowns, lagging, etc. Today is especially bad, had to reboot the cobot twice before lunch.
I also have had issues with accumulation of files that are either invisible to Polyscope or just plain laborious to clean up one by one. I couldn’t understand why backups were taking more than 15 minutes! According to Polyscope, there was only a few programs on the controller.
Eventually I identified that the customer had used a Mac to delete program files from USB memory stick used to upload new/revised programs. The Mac placed the deleted files into hidden .Trashes folder, which urmagic_upload_programs.sh kindly copied from the memory stick onto the controller during the next upload. Then urmagic_backup_programs.sh kindly included the .Trashes folder and contents with the files downloaded from the controller to USB memory stick during subsequent backups. Repeated cycling of this resulted in multiple copies of the entire set of files within the .Trashes folder.
I was finally able to clean up the file system by connecting via FTP. That enabled me to see the .Trashes folder in order to delete it and contents, as well as multi-selecting all of the redundant backup file versions.
A better means of file management will be greatly appreciated!
I appreciate the need to have a “clean” view of the files when loading programs and not having to wade through multiple backups.
Perhaps having a separate interface to the program or script Open dialog would be good, accessed by something like a “Manage Files” item in the Settings menu?
In addition, I would like to understand the relationship between the urp, old, script, and txt files and what causes each to be generated.
I have been using File Zilla to routinely purge files since I commonly rename programs or move them to stay organized as the application grows in scope.
I was messing around in the teach pendant and found out what and when the “old” files are made and that you can restore them (they’re backup files).
When ever you save a URP file it creates an OLDx file as a backup. It will create up to 10 of these files, over-writing the oldest one once you save more than 10 times.
You can see the files by clicking Open then changing the filter at the bottom right to “Backup Files”. I assume opening one will restore it but I’m not sure what happens to the original URP file.
There is still no way to see file details (size, date modified, etc) which would be very helpful.
I am realy afraid to open this because i have made for myself like 10 versions of a program and save it in the mean time also like 10 times. and over the course of 2 years, it will be a one big mess.
I started looking into doing this as well, but I’m afraid of deleting something that might be needed! Though I did make a full backup of everything, I don’t want to disrupt production if not necessary.
I may have to go this route, too. That sucks because I’m not set up for that, but UR is taking a while to get this fixed and every time I add an new program my robot slows down more.
I’m to the point I have to reboot one of my robots every week or so because it gets hot and slows down.
My other robot is fine because it’s only got a half dozen programs.
@RobH I’m just curious if this is moving forward?
The performance hit I’m taking is getting worse. It’s taking between 5 and 15 seconds just to open the File dialog depending on how long ago I rebooted the system (it’s booting now, as I type this).
Can you let us know what the scope of this change will be and maybe a timeline? Will we have the ability to see the created and modified dates like a real file manager?
Seems weird to me that you would be experiencing performance issues due to storage consumption. A typical computer isn’t going to run slower just because your hard drive is filling up unless it’s actually running processes. Likewise, I wouldn’t think rebooting would do anything, since the storage hasn’t changed.
Do you have any additional CAPs installed that might have some memory leak in them? (Speaking from experience on my own CAP from that one lol.) For example, can you start bogging down your robot just by repeatedly opening existing programs? If your UI starts slowing down, and returns to normal due to a reboot, that sounds more like something is chewing up your RAM, and rebooting the system is finally releasing those resources. So unless Polyscope for some reason loads some portion of a stored program in RAM, I can’t see why that would be directly slowing you down.
But it does run slower the more files I have. And rebooting it does make it better. For a while.
I have about 25 to 30 programs on this TP currently and have edited and renamed them more times than I can count, so the actual number of files plus backup files is probably a few hundred.
I have exactly one URCap installed. For the Robotiq grippers. That’s it. Also, I only program and run from the TP, I don’t do scripts or anything. Simple machine tending. I had to reboot it again today which is why I came back here to bump this post.
Several months ago I went through and cleaned out some old stuff (VERY PAINFUL PROCESS) and after that it ran better for quite a while. Then I added a half dozen or so more new programs, made scores of edits, copied and renamed several times then saved scores more times which creates even MORE backup files. That’s when I posted here asking for a way to manage files.
I have another robot, it’s the same thing, same version, same URCaps, same everything except for a couple of I/Os (door stuff). It doesn’t slow down nearly as often. I have maybe 5 or 7 programs on this one and only a few backup files.
And it’s not just the hit to performance that I really AM seeing: It’s also a request for the ability to read file data (created and modified dates, for example).
Users need a good way to keep their file space manageable.
(edit) I’m not saying it’s not something else causing the slowdown, but I am saying that reducing the number of files and rebooting both help. If you have other ideas on what it might be I’d be happy to try them out. But I don’t want to discourage UR from creating this ability.
Oh no don’t get me wrong, the file management is all but nonexistent lol. Had to clean one of our robots to sell to a customer and it was like a 20 minute process of doing nothing but selecting a file, and selecting delete. So it’s definitely needed. I’d love to be able to just delete whole folders too, but I don’t believe you can.
As for slowing down, I kinda doubt Robotiq is gonna have memory leaks, since they make some extremely nice software. But the CAP side of things does do some goofy stuff sometimes, such as running node’s constructors when you copy, AND when you paste. Likewise the Installation node’s constructor is run every time you open a program, and depending on what they do there, might start slowing down your system. (Again, I highly doubt it, since it’s robotiq, but anyone can make mistakes. That’s why I asked if you can accelerate your slow down issue by repeatedly opening programs.)
Yes, I am absolutely DREADING the day I finally bite the pillow and delete hundreds of files One. Stinkin’. File. At. A. Time.
I think a good start for the file management side of things from UR would be a “delete up backup files” action. This would simply remove all the backup files from the TP. They could get fancy and create a popup window that would have all your URP files listed and you could select the ones you don’t need backups for and delete them.
So many options available. I wonder if UR will reach out to us and ask us for particulars regarding the what’s and how’s.
Regarding Robotiq, I have 4 grippers, 2 on each UR. They’re really awesome but I do have issues randomly losing grippers.
For example, running a pallet of parts, more than halfway through the pallet with zero issues, and all of a sudden the gripper moves over a part and the fingers don’t close and the “gripper full” option I use fails. So it leaves a part sitting in the vise and tries to stack another part on top of it. Then I end up with a pile of un-finished parts sitting on the machine bed.
Anyway, I hope this is really a thing for UR. If not I may force myself to add URCap programming to my list of known languages and make one myself.
(edit) FYI, I rebooted this robot yesterday. Today I opened the file manager and selected Backup Files to count them. Now when I hit Open it is back to 5 seconds of lag.
This is insane. Is there a timeline for this to happen? Is it actually gonna happen?
Should I quit holding my breath and set up an FTP connection to clean this crap out?
because i have made for myself like 10 versions of a program and save it in the mean time also like 10 times. and over the course of 2 years, it will be a one big mess. 
