To check a Collection for structural damage, first make a backup copy of the Collection. Then launch Helix Update Collection and select the Collection that you wish to check for damage.
A dialog box will appear with a warning about backing up your Collection. If you made a backup copy, press the "OK, I have a backup" button. If you didn't, click "Cancel, I'll make a backup first" and do so.
A second dialog will appear informing you that this Collection has already been updated. It will also ask if you would like to check the Collection's structural integrity. Click on the "Check Structure" button to run this test. A thermometer bar will be presented indicating the progress of the structural damage check.
Depending upon the result of this test, when Helix Update Collection is finished checking the Collection, it may present different dialogs. Hopefully, you'll always see one that looks like this:
More than likely, it will look like this:
Generally, some "minor maintenance" is performed on a collection when your run Helix Update Collection. You should not worry when you see a message like this; minor maintenance is simple housekeeping that was not done during the normal operation of Helix, probably because the performance hit would be noticable.
Is it also possible that you will see a dialog like this:
This indicates that Update Collection has found a problem it is not able to correct by itself. When you see a message like this, write down the diagnostic code found in the lower left hand corner of the dialog (15/0042/0000C070 in the sample) and dismss the dialog. A second dialog will appear with generic information about the nature of damaged collections and suggesting alternative courses of action to take. Even if you choose to revert to a backup copy of your collection, please contact us and let us know what the diagnostic code - from the first screen - was. This helps us focus on areas in Helix we should work on to help reduce uncorrectable damage.
The performance of Update Collection can be improved significantly — particularly for large collections — by making sure the Collection Buffer is set correctly. Under OS X you simply set the buffer (found in Preferences) to a value large enough to hold your entire collection.
There is no Collection Buffer in the Classic version of Update Collection.
Beginning with version 5.2, Helix Update Collection is scriptable via AppleScript. See the documentation that comes with your version of Update Collection for instructions and sample code.
Beginning with version 5.3, Helix Update Collection contains an additional Diagnostic Mode that can be used to pre-diagnose the extent of structural damage. This is useful when trying to decide whether to schedule a collection repair or to revert to a backup copy of the collection.
Because of the dangerous nature of the diagnostic data, the method of invoking Diagnostic Mode is given on a ‘need to know’ basis. If you have a collection that is ‘Not Corrected’, contact QSA ToolWorks Technical Support to see if Diagnostic Mode is of use to you.