I'm using Billings for a single user, 2 machine environment. I have an iMac and a Macbook and wish to be able to use either one without work/pain/thinking. I found bits and pieces around and got it up and running using iDisk, so I thought I would post my steps as I see others have the same issue and hopefully save them some time.

As mentioned in another posting - your mac account name should be the same on both machines.

Basically, we use iDisk to sync the files from one computer to another, so a mobileme membership is required.

The billings database is located in under your account name/Library/Application Support/Billings/Database/. We can't change this so we create a symbiotic link using terminal.

1. Turn on iDisk Sync by going to System Preferences > Mobile Me > iDisk > iDisk Sync On
2. Once the sync is complete, open the iDisk from finder, go to the Documents folder and create a folder called Billings
3. In /Library/Application Support/Billings/ make a copy of the database folder (just in case) and then move the original to iDisk/Documents/Billings/
4. Open Terminal - Spotlight > Terminal
5. In Terminal - change the folder to the original Billings folder so we can create the symLink. Unix doesn't like the space between Application and Support so we'll do this one folder at a time
6. In Terminal - type cd Library/
7. In Terminal - type cd "Application Support"/ - the quotes help with Terminal understanding the space in the name.
8. In Terminal - type cd Billings/ - this will put you in the original Billings folder. If you want to view the contents of the folder you are currently in, then in Terminal, type ls (as in list)

Now we will create the symLink to the iDisk folder.

9. In Terminal - type ln -s /Volumes/iDisk/Documents/Billings Database - this will create a folder in the original Billings folder called Database, which will point to the iDisk folder.

10. Repeat steps 1-9 on the second computer.

If necessary, manually sync iDisk by clicking the sync icon beside the drive in the finder.

You may need to reset the license after doing this.

I took much of this from this article, http://www.macosxhints.com/art...ry=20031211161009448 and just customized it for Billings.

Hope this helps the individual developers out there.

cheers

Joe

Hi Joe,

Thanks for posting this. One quick question (since I'm worried about corrupting my Billings database), can changes for the two machines be merged automatically, or do you have to manually sync MobileMe before opening Billings on each machine?

If you can confirm, I'll give this a try using DropBox and report back, since I no longer have an active MobileMe subscription.

thanks,

Andrew

This would be great if it weren't for the account name collision. Nice workaround for those with identical accounts.

I don't like having to keep the laptop on and running so I can have an expensive stopwatch while I'm working on my desktop. Seems most inefficient.

Hi Andy,

The changes do merge and I've not had a problem with corrupting the billings db, although i do get a message saying 'rebuilding spotlight files' occasionally.

I don't think this method is 100% as I've seen duplicate account names after sync. I would think that apple uses some form of unique id that is different on the different machines. So i think I'd classify this as an ugly workaround and we should still look for an 'official' solution.

best

Joe

Guys, I would not recommend this approach. I tried it and am now stuck with a major issue after my database got corrupted. I have lost a few weeks worth of data and was advised by MarketCircle that "we don't support using a symlink for the database", so I just have to try and remember all the work that I did for the last few weeks, not to mention go back and re-enter payments, re-create invoices, etc...

Not happy Jan!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Mike,