I recently bought a new computer and transferred my local BioNumerics database (mainly containing sequence data) to this new PC. I copied the database folder, together with the AB trace files. It looks like the transfer is successful, since I can open the database and run comparisons with the sequence data. However, if I now open Assembler for a sequence already present in the database, the traces do not show anymore. What should I do to be able to edit the assemblies again?
This problem occurs because BioNumerics does not save the trace files in a local database. Instead, only the (absolute) path of the files on your computer (or even on a removable drive) is stored in the .ctg files. In a connected database, a copy of the trace files is saved into the database itself when the option Store trace files in database is checked and there the problem does not occur. The easiest solution (but not always possible or practical) is to make sure that the path on the new computer is identical to the path on the old computer. Alternatively, the .ctg files can be edited. They are located in the "contig" folder of your database (default C:\Program Files\BioNumerics\Data\*database_name*\Contig). The .ctg files can be opened in any text editor (e.g. NotePad). Via the "replace" function of the text editor, the old path can be replaced by the new one.