Dave Whipps
Because of the ubiquity of the internet, the vast volumes of data available to us (and therefore you, the SN user) and new security requirements imposed by operating systems, Starry Night 7 has introduced the idea of a "dynamic" (writeable) Sky Data folder.
In previous versions of SN, the application itself would edit (write to) files in its own Sky Data folder located either in the application package (on OSX) or in the Program Files folder (Windows) and this is now considered very bad behavior.
For that reason, any time SN needs to write/modify a file, we so in a new Sky Data folder located at:
SN7:
(Windows) \Users\<YourUserName>\AppData\Local\Simulation Curriculum\Starry Night Prefs\
SN8:
(Windows) \Users\<YourUserName>\AppData\Local\Simulation Curriculum\Starry Night 8 Prefs\
(Note that the AppData folder is often "hidden". A quick Googling can show you how to un-hide it)
SN7:
(OS X) /Users/<YourUserName>/Library/Application Support/Simulation Curriculum/Starry Night Prefs/
SN8:
(OS X) /Users/<YourUserName>/Library/Application Support/Simulation Curriculum/Starry Night 8 Prefs/
Note that this is where any "streamed" data will be located too.
While we've made every effort to hide this ugliness from you the user, if for any reason you want to get your hands dirty and edit a file manually, it should first be copied to the same respective path (e.g. /Sky Data/Planet Images) in this new folder, then edited there.
Any file located in this new Sky Data folder should have the effect of overridding the one in our static Sky Data folder.
Now, for the part you've all been waiting for. How do you get all of your Equipment, Distance Spheres, Locations, Preferences, Custom (User) Planets etc. from SN6 to SN7?
Simply copy the individual files from your old "Prefs" folders into the matching locations in the new "Starry Night Prefs" folder!
Have fun!
By David Whipps
This did not work for me. When I go into SNP7 after copying over my CCDs, DSLRs and Telescopes.txt files, all of the equipment lists are blank. When I look in the Starry Night Prefs/Equipment directory, I find that the program has renamed the files I copied over to <name>.bak and replaced them with files without any equipment in them.
Dan
Hi Dave:
Kieron helped me tremendously with another problem I had. During that process, he noticed that I had copied the SSD files that I had created with prior versions of SN to my SN7 Sky Data folder. He mentioned I should not do that (the same as you over in the yahoo forum) but I said I'd done that before you and he said not to. He said I should use the process you describe above.
I have not done that yet because of Dans' report above. I know Dan well. We live near each other and have been using SN since the very early days. The only thing I have done with SN7 is to modify the jupitergrs.txt file and copy the extra SSD files. I have not copied, added or edited any other files in SN7. I look forward to being able to port my equipment list and preference files as soon as Dan says he's had success.
Regards - Grant martin
I'm also having trouble with this. Of primary concern to me are my observing logs. These do not appear to be written to the SN6 app package (OS X).
I was able to import my SN6 data into SN7 tonight. The procedure in the article above is correct, but I found my data files in a different folder. Try going to (Windows) \Users\<YourUserName>\AppData\Local\Imaginova Canada\Prefs\
In that folder, I opened the Equipment Folder and checked the equipment text files (Telescopes.txt, Eyepieces.txt, etc.) and found that they had my most recent data from SN6. I then copied those files to (Windows) \Users\<YourUserName>\AppData\Local\Simulation Curriculum\Starry Night Prefs\ and opened SN7. When I edited my equipment list, all of my equipment data was there.
I also copied the \Logs folder from the Imaginova Canada prefs folder to the Simulation Curriculum folder, but haven't found a way to open the observing logs in SN7 yet. In the PDF manual that ships with SN7, I can't find any mention of observing logs, only observation lists that you can create in advance to plan an evening of observing.
Neither the Logs nor the logging features are supported by V7. No one knows when they will be enabled, if at all. As of this date, many V6 features remain disabled and several usability bugs remain. No real good news on the V7 front. Sorry I can't be more helpful - they don't tell us what was added, fixed or removed with each release.
David Whips. please give us a comprehensive solution for user aded data migration from V6 to V7, that includes every category of data we use Location, Time steps , FOV for all charts. and make it automatic. or at least a real guide. not this " I never tried it but it looked good answer. "
No such directory. NO SIMULATION CURRICULUM directory on my mac.
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Just to update this post. Today on 5.21.16 because of the Quicktime removal alert I decided to upgrade from SN 6.0.1 PP to 7.5.0.951 PP 7...I've had PP 6 X 10 years, hundreds of Observing Logs, and felt I had better make the upgrade since the price wasn't too steep. I originally had XP, then Win 7, now Win10 and SN PP 6 works on all machines with 6.0.1. [I was unable to upgrade past 6.0.1 without paying. SN 6.2 and 6.3 were a disaster...] However I had no issue going to SN PP 7 on Win 10 after paying for the upgrade. It took a bit of trial / error to get the logs/ equipment to finally go, but go they did!
The program is much more stable than SN PP 6, and I am finding that it is a deeper and better program than 6. So if you are wondering, I can say they have put forth much effort to make this a great program. If you are worried about the Observing Logs, Equipment, etc., fear not. You can transfer them.
I've been using StarryNight for a long time, updating with each new version. I have noticed that the Starry Night Prefs folder for SN7 is much larger than the Starry Night 8 Prefs folder, even though I have imported the V7 data (via the help menu) and uninstalled SN7. I also note that when I run SN8 it "touches" a lot of files in the old V7 Starry Night Prefs folder (i.e. it updates the last accessed date).
Is it possible to complete the import into SN8 and then safely delete the old V7 Starry Night Prefs folder?
If I try to execute the V7 import it tells me this has already been done, and may create duplicate files.