file names with slash cause errors. without slash are ok

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Level 1

127 points

file names with slash cause errors. without slash are ok

Lately, and only lately - it's been fine before this, when I try to "share"/save a movie with a file name that has a slash in it (like a date, 7/8/09) I get an error message saying the movie can't be compressed, blah blah blah... If I change the name to one without the slash, it works.

So, it isn't a compression problem. It is an OS/iMovie problem. Why? I am up to date with all my updates, QT 7.6.2, 10.4.11.

Thank you.

John L

15" Powerbook/1.67 Ghz (DL/HR), Mac OS X (10.4.11), 1.5 gb RAM, Fantom 250 gb external firewire drive

Posted on Jul 8, 2009 6:14 PM

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Answer 1

Jul 8, 2009 10:51 PM in response to lipwak

Hi

Just to add in esp. reg. going to iDVD and Multiplex-Error

I Would not use any . or # or other strange letter to keep problems down

*Multiplexing Error*

Use of strange video/audio material eg .avi, .wmv, .mp3 etc.

I only use.
Video - StreamingDV (miniDV tape via FireWire) and
Audio = .aiff (as on audio-CDs) (else coverted to this .aff 48KHz)

*Using strange letters in video project name eg +,/; etc. keep to a-z and 0-9*
*strange letters in project name eg +*
*as described by Donnyboy69. Does the title of your project have any symbols or decimal points in it. If so, that is why you are getting the error. I had a project that had a + sign which caused the same problem. I renamed it without the symbol and low and behold, it worked.*

from Robert Modero.
"Multiplexing Error. Problem during initialization of tracks"
Simply remember to add subtitles to your Quicktime files and menu buttons.
Once I did that, I was back in business.

I always makes a DiskImage first and test this so that it runs OK

I use only - Verbatim DVDs

I use only - DVD-R

I burn at an as slow speed possibly eg x1

This gives good DVDs

Yours Bengt W

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Answer 2

catspaw

Level 5

4,344 points

Jul 8, 2009 10:54 PM in response to lipwak

And just to add to Bengt's excellent and useful list, '&' can cause problems too.

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Answer 3

Jul 9, 2009 3:18 AM in response to lipwak

John Lippincott wrote:
.. Why? ..

+in addendum+ to Bengt's and Bruce' excellent replies:

because /, ., #, etc are used by UNIX (MacOs is based upon Unix) as symbols for file operations..
/ means, goto a subfolder...
. means, end of name, suffix following (imovie.mov)...

you can write whole sentences as file names.. as long as you avoid some 'signs'.
i like the goo' ol' _ as seperator, Karsten_Schluter 😉

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Answer 4

lipwak Author

Level 1

127 points

Jul 9, 2009 7:37 AM in response to Karsten Schlüter

So this is an OSX problem? I could have sworn I didn't have problems in the past. I thought we could do that (save any file with a slash in the name) in any other program the Mac uses and it wouldn't be a problem. (Only poorly written programs had this problem in my experience.) I thought the people who write these programs took the fact that the slash is a Unix operator into account. So that should happen in any other program too,right? One that it doesn't is TextEdit. I give many file names dates with slashes in that program and it doesn't cause a problem. Why should it in iMovie?

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Answer 5

Jul 9, 2009 7:46 AM in response to lipwak

Because iMovie uses POSIX file i/o and TextEdit doesn't.
A design choise by the programmers.

Simply put: In POSIX a slash is used to separate the folders from the disk name and from the file name.

Posix:
HardDrive/folder1/folder2/file
The original "Mac" style uses colon:
HardDrive:folder1:folder2:file

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Answer 6

lipwak Author

Level 1

127 points

Jul 9, 2009 8:20 AM in response to lipwak

OK, so I did some testing. test.test worked. test&test worked. test & test worked. I tried to save as test:test and iMovie CHANGED the character to - immediately after I typed it! (Why doesn't it do something for /?) Test,test worked. test # test worked.

So, it seems to be only / so far that causes a problem and instead of giving a correct error message (characters such as / (and whatever else that doesn't work) cannot be used) it gives me a compression error message. Shouldn't Apple have done a better job with that?

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Answer 7

Jul 9, 2009 9:44 AM in response to lipwak

Shouldn't Apple have done a better job with that?

Yes.
But they didn't and we just have to live with it. There will be no more updates on iMovie 6.

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Answer 8

lipwak Author

Level 1

127 points

Jul 9, 2009 8:40 PM in response to Lennart Thelander

OK. Is there a list of other apps that we can't use Unix operators on? is iMovie the only one? I'll only ask for Apple apps but if others want to add third party apps, great.

Cheers,

John L

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Answer 9

Jul 9, 2009 11:23 PM in response to lipwak

Is there a list of other apps that we can't use Unix operators on?

No.

is iMovie the only one?

The only one I know of.

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