Summary: I detail my bumblings around in Radio's weblogData.root, aka my site database. My intended purposes: (a)to record my experience for the sake of remembering what worked and what didn't and (b) to pass on the experience to others, like me not so technically inclined, in the hopes of encouraging exploration.

If you are a Radio subscriber you probably know that much of Radio's infrastructure is written using an outliner format Knowing this I searched until I found data concerning my posts, their trackbacks, comments etc. It isstored in the WeblogData.root in the file Data Files which I found in my Data Files folder (which is stored in the Applications folder on my Macintosh Power Book and on my Imac).

I decided that I HAD to go digging around because a significant number of my entries (from October 15 through say March 10th) weren't being published once I looked at my published Radio site after I'd taken the portable to the West Coast. And, I had only vague clues as to the specifics of why. [For example: I lost several items when I moved from my imac to the portable to take a trip out west--I speculated, vaguely, mind you, that maybe I hadn't copied all of the entry files from one machine to the other.]

Finally, after having received no information on repair, at least no information that I could make work , from Radio Userland's extensive instruction set, I took my intellectual life and the future of my entry files in my own, incapable [but not risk-averse] hands. Yep, I started to poke around under Radio's hood-- that is, in the database. After, that is, I backed up the entire Radio Userland file. (If I made things worse I could at least go back to my present situation by using the backup. I didn't want to think about a full reinstall).

I opened up the file that seemed appropriate (weblogData.root) using the Radio userland software itself(Radio/File/Open/DataFiles/weblogData.root).

[If the uppermost heading is the only thing that is exposed you will see only 'weblogData'. I did that and expanded weblogData by double clicking. ]

• cache??
• callbacks??
• categories: [aha ...this when expanded to list the categories underwhich entries or copies of entries are stored]
• liveTopics:because I also use Matt Mower's live topics "categorize your entries on the fly" software to use with my entries... helps me root around in my 200 plus entries and remember, reconfigure my "knowledge-base".
• posts: where, I found, everything having to do with individual entries is stored : the categories applied to the entry,the exact date and time of its publication and more. The post permalink is in the file title itself. That is, the first file under posts is 00000002 and its permalink is #a2. My mosts recent entry is stored as post file named '00000242' and its permalink number is #a243. When I publish this entry it will, I expect, be stored as file 00000241.
• prefs: I found overwhelming detail here, clearly it was where operational preferences that had been set initially (and which could be altered at any time from Radio's local home page) but one item related to my concerns; NextPostNum. In my case the number was part of what caused me to spot the problem in the first place; my new entries were being misnumbered. This number was one more than the most recent misnumbered entry. Since it was in prefs I made a wild guess: one could set the number at any level and then the program would advance it by one for each entry made. So I reset it after I had pasted in the missing items.
• shortcuts: One interesting observation; under personal was an alphabetically organized list of all of my posts, permlinks and all. That could be useful.
• stats
• trash

It was this newly acquired file understanding that led me to compare the 'post' section of two copies (the imac copy and the portable copy) of my weblogData.root files. Voila! They were different. One had missing items in the middle. I copied the missing items from the original file into the weblogData.root file (post section) of my portable. It worked.

For now, at least, I have complete access to all of my entries on the published version of my weblog. Plus..I have the newly constructed, yet tentative, belief that maybe, just maybe, I can fix the next problem that comes up!! [;o])

I have to add, however, that the problem-solving is not why I weblog. If I could own weblogging software that had the same great features but was less prone to triipping me up I would be very pleased.

For a more expert, and more entertaining and instructive, recapturing of the "fix Radio" experience read Scott Johnson's story, When Your Data Goes Away or Don't Worry Be Happy