Question about file size.

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Svetlana Akulova
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Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

Hello!
I'm working with H&M7, the file is big and I try all possible ways to reduce it. Now, for example, the file size is 5331 bytes. And I found a strange thing. I am rewriting the page, the number of rows has decreased, I save the file and see what file size has grown to 5333 bytes. Like a trifle, but the file will contain many pages and such a small thing will affect performance.
Why when you reduce the size of the page, the file size increases?
Then I tried to do the following: I highlighted the paragraph written by one style, and again apply the same style. And there was miracle - after saving, the file size got smaller! :o Then I tried it with another similar part of the text, but the miracle did not happen, the file size increased! :?
Tell me, please, what is it? Why? How to reduce the file size?
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Tim Green
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Svetlana,
Now, for example, the file size is 5331 bytes. And I found a strange thing. I am rewriting the page, the number of rows has decreased, I save the file and see what file size has grown to 5333 bytes.
5000 bytes is nothing for a topic file on a current computer. This is something that is so insignificant that it is not even worth spending ten seconds to think about it. :)
Like a trifle, but the file will contain many pages and such a small thing will affect performance.
No, it won't. You would not even be able to measure the effect in any significant way. Even if the size increased from 5,000 bytes to 50,000 bytes you would almost never see any subjective difference. What might cause a difference of a couple of bytes doesn't really matter at all -- it was probably something like the timestamp in the the "last edited by..." information at the top of the file. Or something in the formatting that used a couple of bytes more. But really: Don't waste your time on issues like this, it really really really doesn't matter at all.
Then I tried to do the following: I highlighted the paragraph written by one style, and again apply the same style. And there was miracle - after saving, the file size got smaller! :o Then I tried it with another similar part of the text, but the miracle did not happen, the file size increased!
Same here: These are totally and completely unimportant things that will never have any effect on anything, ever... 8)
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

Thanks for the reply, Tim!
But apparently, you have very powerful computers :typing: because our computers can't handle a H&M file size of 50,000 bytes :D . We will likely see blue screen of death, or the maintenance will be delayed for a long long long time :vconfused: :vconfused: :vconfused: )))
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Tim Green
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Tim Green »

Svetlana,

Just to be sure: Are you talking about bytes or megabytes? Also, which files are you referring to? A single topic XML file in the topics folder in an uncompressed project, or the entire project file (.hmxz) in a compressed, single-file project?
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

Tim, in the first message I mentioned 5333 bytes, in other words 5.3 megabytes.
Tim Green wrote:Also, which files are you referring to?
Ang I mean "the entire project file (.hmxz) in a compressed, single-file project".
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Tim Green
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Svetlana,
in the first message I mentioned 5333 bytes, in other words 5.3 megabytes.
5,333 bytes is actually approx. 5 kilobytes, which is approx. 0.005 megabytes. One kilobyte is 1024 bytes. A megabyte is 1,048,576 bytes or 1,024 Kilobytes. See this page for a complete summary:

https://www.computerhope.com/issues/chspace.htm

However, even if the file is 5.3 megabytes that is a very small project. And the difference between a project file that is 5.331 megabytes and one that is 5.333 megabytes is effectively nothing, almost a rounding error. You will not see any difference in performance or anything else with a size differential like this.
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

OK, Tim, thanks for your answers.
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

Hello again!
Again asking about the file size, but in a slightly different way.
Interested in such question: is there any temporary (or cloud) files in HM that are saved every time the document is saved. Perhaps, it is not clear posing the question. But the problem that started this topic relevant for me.
I repeat the point: when performing actions leading to an obvious decrease in the file size, such as deleting rows, deleting pages (including those from Topics), the size does not decrease, but rather increases when saving. Which is weird. Or is that okay?
Therefore there was a question about any "cloud" files.
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Tim Green
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Tim Green »

Svetlana Akulova wrote:I repeat the point: when performing actions leading to an obvious decrease in the file size, such as deleting rows, deleting pages (including those from Topics), the size does not decrease, but rather increases when saving. Which is weird. Or is that okay?
This is fine. What is happening is that every time you change a topic and save you are getting a new backup copy of that topic inside the internal history folder, which allows you to return to previous versions of your topics if you decide that you changed something that you want to change back again. You can increase or reduce the number of history files that are saved, or turn the history off entirely (not recommended). See here in the documentation for information on this:

https://helpandmanual.com/help/index.ht ... istory.htm
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

Thank You, Tim! That's what I need! :-o I will not completely disable the history, but will slightly reduce it. :D

But one more question. Is it possible to reduce history to specific pages? Or just for every pages?
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Tim Green »

Svetlana Akulova wrote:But one more question. Is it possible to reduce history to specific pages? Or just for every pages?
The history is global for all topics. It is either on or off, and the settings apply for all topics when it is on.
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Svetlana Akulova
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Re: Question about file size.

Unread post by Svetlana Akulova »

OK, I get it. Thank you very much, Tim.
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