File System Repository does not recognize new files

Since Continua does not support our version control system Rational Team Concert we use an external tool to check out the source from from the version control system to a file system repository. Continuas Files System Repository does not seem to recognize if new files have beed added to the repository directory. One has to click the “reset” link in the repository administration section to force continua to recognize the new file.
We reproduced this by defining a test “File System” repository and a trigger of type “Repositrory” which should fire if the repository changed. Then we added new files to the repository directory but the trigger never fires.

Hi Marc

I haven’t been able to reproduce this here. Is your file system repository on a local drive on the CI server? We use the .net filesystem watcher library, and it doesn’t do well with network drives or virtual drives. It’s been a long time since I looked at RTC, but I seem to remember it creates a virtual drive on your machine?

It’s highly unlikely that we would ever add support for RTC, just getting a copy of the software without paying for it is next to impossible with IBM, we’ve been burned by them in the past, paying thousands of dollars for what amounted to a 12 month trial license.

Hi Marc,

The file system repository actually uses Robocopy to copy and list any changed files periodically according to the polling frequency (we originally used the file system watcher but changed this years ago to use Ropocopy due to its performance when copying files) .

As we are enable to reproduce this issue, we’ll need some more details from you to figure out out the cause. First check that the Polling Frequency is not set to Manual in the repository settings? Then check whether any changesets are listed on the Changes tab on the configuration view. If changes are listed but not triggering a build then we would need to look at your trigger settings to work out the cause of the issue. The easiest way to send us these settings is by downloading the diagnostics report from the Event Log page under the Administration section of Continua CI. Send this to support@finalbuilder.com rather than posting here.

Next check the Event Log page for any errors related to the repository? If there are errors send them to us along with the version of Continua CI you are running, the version of Windows on the server and the file version of robocopy.exe (usually located in c:\windows\system32). Otherwise, if there are no errors, we’ll need to see a debug log. If you can enable debug logging, restart the Continua CI Server service, add a file to the relevant folder for your repository, wait long enough for polling to occur and then send the log file to support@finalbuilder.com, this will provide us with plenty of details to diagnose your issue.

Hi Marc,

Thank you for reporting this and sending the log files. The issue was due to us expecting English language output from the robocopy command line. Due to this issue and other issues using robocopy we decided to rewrite the file system repository using our own file synchronisation code. Please download version 1.8.1.706 which includes this update.


Hi David,

I just installed the new release on a test server. The results look very positive until now. 

Thank you for your fast support.

with best regards,
Marc Sachtleber