Stats deleted upon stack update

Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby robert » Sat Jun 11, 2022 10:19 pm

Hi all,

I just wanted to update my main vocabulary stack for the first time and chose the option "replace all cards (stats are maintained if text is identical)" (the phrasing may not be a 100% identical because I'm using the German version of the app). My main stack is relatively big (5500 cards) and I only had around 300 new cards, so I reckoned 97% of the cards would be kept and the 3% that were new would be added.

After processing the updated CSV, however, the app told me that "no cards were replaced because there was no matching text". I was a bit surprised because the two versions were simple CSV files with no changes in encoding or structure. Even the first 100 lines were fully identical, the first new word appeared further below. Both versions were alphabetically sorted so the new words were interspersed among the old. First I thought "well, at least I have my old cards with the old stats". But then I found out with horror that while the app had not touched the existing 5500, it had nevertheless set back all the stats (so far around 4000 card views).

Has anybody else experienced this problem? Did I somehow misunderstand the replacement mode and this is normal behavior? And can similar stuff happen in the append mode, too (I thought I'd better use that one next time)?

Robert
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Re: Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby Ernie » Sun Jun 12, 2022 8:41 pm

Hi Robert,

I will do a test on my end and get back to you by tomorrow. I don't know why statistics would have been deleted, nor why you got that error message if you think the cards matched up.

You said CSV. My app doesn't read CSV (directly), so not sure what format you import is in. The app imports Tab separated values, or Excel files.

Can you tell me how you were importing the file? Copy-paste to my website? Dropbox? OneDrive? Google Drive?
If you were using one of the last 3 above, check a folder called "Decks before Update" in the "Flashcards Deluxe" folder to see if you have a copy of the deck there with statistics. If this file was overwritten due to multiple "updates", they also keep old versions that can be restored (using their websites).

Ernie
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Re: Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby Ernie » Mon Jun 13, 2022 10:32 pm

I tried some tests and I wasn't able to duplicate a problem.

You got an error, "no match text". When this happens, your existing statistics should not be touched. I don't know why your statistics were lost.
I like using the "download / replace all cards" option instead of append, but you can use append as an alternative approach. When "download/replace", the app will look for unique matches between Text 1 and/or Text 2, between old and new cards. If a match found, it will copy statistics to new cards. If you change both Text 1 and Text 2 for a card, statistics will likely be lost, as the app likely won't be able to find a match (unless it can using Picture). You can add an "ID" column to your Excel file (and number your rows 1...X) as a solution to keeping statistics if you change both Text 1 and Text 2, but I don't do this myself.

You get the "no match text" error when no matching cards can be found between old and new cards. Maybe the format of your text changed.

Ernie
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Re: Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby Guest » Mon Jul 11, 2022 1:19 pm

Hi Ernie,

Thank you for the detailed reply and sorry for not answering so long, I was a bit busy.

First getting back to your questions: When I first got the "no match text" error I was using TSV (I just said CSV because I'm used to using these two interchangeably, it's just the separator that's different) and the upload via website option.

Meantime I managed to make the "replace all cards" option work by using the Dropbox method instead. This way I do not get an error message and the two stacks are successfully merged - excellent! However, there's still one thing I don't understand: after merging, the app seems to forget the overall stats and starts going through all cards again. More specifically, I was using the random learning mode ("Lernmodus zufällig") and had worked on some 200 cards (that is, after the first crash described below - originally I had around 4000). My correctness rate was at 85%. Now that I've merged in my newest words I'm once more back at card 1 and 0%. The card-level statistics are kept (I checked the word list this time, the app remembers how often each card was answered correctly) but it's still frustrating that the rate seems to be gone and I have to start going through all cards again. Or am I doing something wrong? Any help is greatly appreciated!

Cheers,
Robert
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Re: Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby Ernie » Sat Jul 16, 2022 10:31 am

Hi Robert,

Dropbox and the website should both work as far as keeping statistics, so not sure what happened first time. Glad you got that working.

As for losing your position in the deck after an update, yes, the app will start back with card #1 after running download/update. What I recommend, especially with a deck as large as yours, is to set Card Order = "Short Term Goal". This should be more efficient for learning a large deck, and it will remember your progress better after a download/update.

Ernie
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Re: Stats deleted upon stack update

Postby Guest » Sat Jul 16, 2022 9:52 pm

Hi Ernie,

Thanks again, I'll try the short-term goal mode.

I think preserving the deck-level stats after updates would be a cool feature for people who prefer to store their whole vocabulary in a single deck. Maybe something for the future? But meantime thank you for the app, anyways!

Robert
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