Made a mistake with VI

[Jerren]

So Transmission has a standard limit of 5 concurrent downloads, i wanted to up this to 10 because i have 5 downloads that have been going for ages, progressing slowly each month. So i tried to look into how to change this, i found a thread about someone who did this and tried to replicate it. But when i used a similar command to my personal server, i got to see the .json file and i saw the "download-queue-size": 5, line but i couldn't edit that number. Not knowing what to do next i just closed the browserwindow and thought i'll look into it another time. So i kept looking and i found further down in the thread a post that had a "edit" command which i thought would allow me to see the same file but would also allow me to edit it. This for some reason gave me nothing but ~~~~ signs on every line that previously had text. What i did wrong i don't know, i knew that i couldn't do anything with this so i just closed the browsertab again. Now when i try to go to the webgui of transmission i just get a simple "this site isn't reachable".

So like my header says, i'm pretty sure i made a mistake with the "vi /usr/local/etc/transmission/home/settings.json " command or with the "edit /mnt/(v1 - insert yours)/iocage/jails/transmission/root/usr/local/etc/transmission/home/settings.json". Most likely the edit command. But i got no experience at all with the vi command which is some sort of text editor for command line if google is right? So i'm a bit at a loss at what to do next. Is this easily fixable? Or should i reinstall Transmission?

 

[Samuel Tai]

From Googling around, try stopping the Transmission plugin, and deleting the settings.json file at /mnt/<your pool name here>/iocage/jails/transmission/root/usr/local/etc/transmission/home/settings.json. On the next start, Transmission will install a default settings.json file you can then customize.

If vi isn't your speed for editors, you can try nano.

 

[danb35]

nano is much easier to use (IMO) than vi, but not part of a standard jail install (though it's easy enough to install). Another easy-to-use editor that is part of the standard jail is ee.

 

[Jerren]

I just deleted the file, started the plugin and i still get the same "this site can't be reached" message. Also no new settings.json file got made.

On a side note, before deleting the file i tried opening it with notepad and changed the line that way, seemed to work fine so maybe that's a safer way to go at it then command line next time?

 

[Yorick]

Definitely not safe, Notepad may save with CRLF, which you don't want. Notepad++ would be okay - but ee really is easy to use, and arguably you want to learn the basics of vi(m), only because it's available everywhere.

 

[Jerren]

Ok i'll have to look up a tutorial then on how to use vi or something similar because i do agree it might come in handy. But the situation stays the same for now because i've restarted, stopped & started the plugin a couple times now and i still don't have a new settings.json file. Any other ways to get it back? Or do i need to reinstall the plugin?

 

[Yorick]

Are you taking snapshots? You could roll back to the last known good snapshot.

 

[Jerren]

Luckily Transmission made a snapshot itself on the 22nd of last month. So i'm gonna try that rollback function now and see what happens.

Edit: I tried stopping the plugin before doing the rollback, after i did the rollback i started it up again but still not reachable. Also no restored settings.json file. Guess i should just reinstall Transmission then?

 

[Ericloewe]

vi isn't too horrible after you're forced to use it because the alternative is ed a bunch of times.
After a year of torture, you can do fancy things like inserting new lines, exiting vi, replacing multiple characters or searching for regexes.

 

[Jerren]

Thanks for the help! I reinstalled the transmission plugin and used vi to edit the file. I looked at a tutorial on vi to see what to do. I couldn't for some reason remove/delete the number 5 so instead i just put a 1 in front of it so i now allow 15 instead of the planned 10.

Again thanks for all the help!