Do you still use Windows 7? don't upgrade your sync chain to 3.0

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1

Just putting it out there so the community would be aware of this topic.

Background

Since 3.0 brought breaking changes, 2.14 is made to refuse sync if there's a device in sync chain using 3.0

Problem with Windows 7 and Joplin 2.12

No longer supported, Joplin 2.12 (last working version on Windows 7) -- doesn't have the sync block introduced in 2.14. Hence it's technically possible to sync between 3.0 and 2.12. However, because of breaking changes it's strongly encouraged not to do that. To put it bluntly, updating any device to 3.0 in sync chain where Windows 7 is present may potentially corrupt your Joplin database.

What should user do if she still uses Windows 7

If one of your devices still uses windows 7, it's recommended to stay on 2.0+ of Joplin i.e. not to upgrade any device in sync chain to 3.0. But if you did accidentally updated any device in your sync chain, I recommend you to export/import your profile back into version 2.0

RE "I've been syncing 2.12 and 3.0 for months just fine, clearly it's non-issue"

Indeed many people reached out saying they haven't got any problems even when they worked with "Trash bin" feature. However, it's important to understand that going forward there's no testing happening for use case of syncing 2.12 and 3.0. So even if in present you're not affected, all future issues you might experience won't be supported and subsequently probably won't be fixed

I personally respect your choice of using unsupported OS and software versions but I wanna stress this point once again -- you are on your own

If anything stated above is false, inappropriate or misleading, pls let me know

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2

What should I do ?
Spoiler : Windows 7 users should make a favor to themselves moving to a new computer or upgrade to Windows 10.

3

One of my devices is Windows 7. Just to be clear on what you are advising, when you say "don’t upgrade your sync chain to 3.0", you are referring to the Joplin version, and not the sync version, correct?

I'm running Joplin version 2.12.5, which has Sync Version 3 and Profile version 43. And I'm successfully syncing between Window, Linux and Android. Thanks.

4

Yes indeed all mentions of 3.0 refer to Joplin 3.0+

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5

graphit0, thank you for clarifying.

I have Windows 10 installed on a different system. Tonight, on that system, I fired up Joplin and checked for updates, and it offered to update to some version of Joplin 3. But that would break syncing with Joplin on my Windows 7 system, which is still my primary system. At this point, I need to ensure Joplin keeps working on my Windows 7 system.

Is there anything I can do so Joplin on my mobile phone and other computers does not upgrade Joplin to version 3 or greater, so I stay sync compatible with Joplin on my Windows 7 system?

Thanks.

6

Just make sure that no system installs updates automatically. That‘s all you need to do.

  1. Windows: You cannot update Joplin on windows automatically, so you are save here as long as you do not start the process yourself.
  2. IOS: Disable automatic updates for apps in the device settings for the app store
  3. Android, MacOS, Linux: I have no knowledge about those systems, but I‘m sure it’s possible to disable automatic updates as well - if at all available
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@Wimvan Thank you for the reply. On Windows 10, when I started up Joplin, it immediately (without my doing anything) popped up a message box saying a new version was available, with a button at the bottom offering for me to upgrade. Knowing I have this Windows 7 limitation, I just closed the message box without upgrading.

However, this prompt to upgrade could cause someone with less experience major difficulties. Joplin really needs a mechanism to detect when one of a user's installations is limiting upgrades, and help that user avoid upgrades that will cause problems.

8

An unofficial and unsupported way to force the latest versions of Joplin to work under Windows 7 and 8

Steps

  • Install VxKex.
  • Install recent version (2.14+) of Joplin. The installation should proceed without errors.
  • Go to the folder where the application is installed, find the EXE file (not a shortcut), go to its properties, and enable VxKex.
  • Enjoy the latest versions of Joplin.

Note: This method works for any applications written on Electron.

Credit: XYZ-Moscow

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