Images Folder vs Database - Migration Options ?

[opensource]

Hello Dr. Jordan / Team,

Looks like we now have an ability to store all the images in the database ( http://www.open-dent.com/manual/paths.html? ). Great Addition to ensure all Opendental related information stays in one location and in a secured environment.

Wondering if anyone has a migration script to move the current images to database. Dr. Jordan, Is this something in the works ?. How would you recommend we go about doing this..if we want to do it. I think the pain of going through a one time migration will have a lot of benefits in a long run.

On a kind-of-related topic, The digital X-rays taken using XDR are stored in a seperate database (which is not opensource). Do you plan to integrate such database into opendental. Not a must have but i hate it when there are too many places for something to go wrong and one has to troubleshoot so many different areas when a problem does occur.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts...

Cheers,

OpenSource

[jordansparks]

NO NO NO. Do not store images in the database. This feature was added by someone else, and I should have protested it more strongly when it happened. In current versions, we have great big warnings to prevent people from doing this. Use it at your own risk. Expect updates to be difficult. Expect it to break many features such as email attachments, claimforms, claim attachments, updates, etc, etc. This is one disadvantage of open source, but we're learning. I have to be strong and to protect everyone from poorly implemented "features".

[opensource]

Hello Dr. Jordan,

Thanks for your quick response.

I agree, we need some additional control's...especially on the source files that are available through open-dent. Maybe you can put all of these addiitonal features in a seperate bucket (third party plug-in's or whatever). Also, while compiling, maybe..there could be a method to ask if this should be integrated in the file version.

I think you did indicate that backward compactibility would not exist but I was not aware of other features getting impacted. Thanks for the clarification.

We do want to encourage folks from adding new features...that is the true spirit of opensource but let us put the appropriate warnings/control's in place so that folks can use the vanilla flavor offered by open-dent. Other plug-ins offered by third parties/users can be use at your own risk

Just my .02 cents

Cheers,

Opensource