"Failed to open database file" error

Hi there,

I’m hoping someone can help me. I was using an older version of Audacity on my Mac for many years. I recently switched to a Windows 10 machine and downloaded Audacity 3.1.3. I spent a few hours editing a recorded podcast. I used an older podcast, opened it, saved as, and then imported my new audia. Ihen I wanted to record some new audio to add to it. When I pressed record, I got an error message, which unfortunately I did not screenshot. I clicked save and closed the file, hoping that when I re-opened it that recording would work, but now it won’t open. Can someone help me figure this out or recover it?

When I re-open the file, I get the following error (I’ve [BLANKED] out the file name to protect the privacy of the people’s names who are in it):

{
“timestamp”: 1645637327,
“event_id”: “7e5288ea36be9742bd697244adbbc010”,
“platform”: “native”,
“release”: “audacity@3.1.3”,
“contexts”: {
“os”: {
“type”: “os”,
“name”: “Windows”,
“version”: “10.0.19044”
}
},
“exception”: {
“values”: [
{
“type”: “Error_Opening_Project”,
“value”: “Failed to open database file:\n\nGoogle [BLANKED]20220215 - [BLANKED]- [BLANKED]20220215 [BLANKED]”,
“mechanism”: {
“type”: “runtime_error”,
“handled”: false,
“data”: {
“sqlite3.rc”: “11”,
“sqlite3.context”: “DBConnection::ModeConfig”,
“sqlite3.mode”: “PRAGMA .page_size = 65536;VACUUM;”,
“log”: “19:28:47: DBConnection SetDBError\n\tErrorCode: 11\n\tLastError: Failed to set page size for database Google [BLANKED]20220215 [BLANKED]20220215 - [BLANKED]-[BLANKED]\n\tLibraryError: database disk image is malformed\n19:28:47: DBConnection SetError\n\tErrorCode: 11\n\tLastError: Failed to open database file:\n\nGoogle [BLANKED]20220215 -[BLANKED]20220215 - [BLANKED]\n\tLibraryError: (11): database disk image is malformed\n”
}
}
}
]
}
}

The “sqlite3.rc”: “11” message means that your .aup3 file is corrupted.

To fix this see: Corrupt or Otherwise Broken Audacity Project Recovery

Thanks for this!

I actually found it and followed the steps after I posted. I did get a file that I could open but none of the audio is preserved. The track names are there but they just contain a bit of noise.

I received a lot of “block not found” errors when running the recovery.

Is there anything else I can try?

Not that I know of. If you care to zip up your .aup3 file and upload it to a public file sharing service, then post (or PM me) a link to the file, I’ll try to take a look at it tomorrow when I get back from out of town.

However, it is unlikely I will find anything more than you have found.

Thank you for that offer. I’m uploading it to G Drive and will try to share it with you via PM.

Is there a way to download an older version of Audacity that does not save things to a single file but uses the old file structure so that I can avoid these types of issues? What would the last version be that works that way?

I note that you’ve given people some feedback about not hosting on a cloud drive. I do use Google Drive to sync that folder, but the files are stored locally and synchronised (not streamed). Could that still be the issue? It’s a bit unfortunate if it works that way as the benefit of Google Drive is a constant backup.

I see that I’m not allowed to post private messages yet. Can you help? Perhaps I can respond to a message from you?

I’ve sent you a PM. Did you get it?

That would be version 2.4.2. Personally, I would not recommend it. I feel things would be far worse with that version. Nevertheless, you wouldn’t be the only one; you can download it here: Old Audacity versions download Note that 2.4.2 will not open .aup3 project files.

I’m not going to speculate any further than I have already done.

Thank you! PM response coming at you.

Really appreciate all the help.

It seems that I can’t reply to PMs either! Darn.

I’d prefer not to put the file out there in public, so I’ll leave it for now.

Thanks for the offer of help.

You should be able to now. Please try again.

OK; I have forwarded your DB to the developers. We’ll see what they have to say.

I am having the same issue I can’t open my file I worked on. It says failed to open database file can you help me.

Here is the trick: Corrupt or Otherwise Broken Audacity Project Recovery :smiley:

Thank you so much, my husband was able to recover it with your steps!!! You saved me a lot of stress tonight thank you! :smiley:

I am glad to hear you are back up and running. Be sure to back up your project. :smiley:

Sorry to pester. Is there any feedback at this stage? I’m trying to decide if I should get started on doing it again from scratch.

No problem.

Unfortunately I have not heard back from the developers. :frowning: This indicates they currently have other priorities, so I suspect this one will fall through the cracks. At some time in the future, they may get back to this issue, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Similarly, I had written some recovery tools myself, but they were all made obsolete by new versions of Audacity. I have been thinking of trying to get back to them this summer, but we’ll see just where my priorities lie at that time. :wink:

If you have a great deal of time available, you could try reviewing all of the potential recovery options (and combinations thereof) offered by the recovery tools. Perhaps I made a mistake or missed something.

The only other thing I can think of is to try a Raw Import of your .aup3 project file; first try the options: float-32, Little-Endian, Mono. Unfortunately, it is usually easier to re-record than to try to make sense of this mumble jumbo.

I’ll try to send you a custom “import” from my now obsolete program - I don’t expect you will be happy with this audio either. Just so you know, there doesn’t seem to be more that 35 minutes at the most of (jumbled) audio available in your project.

Thank you for trying.

It seems that I managed to get a version from Google Drive that at least had the first part of the editing done. I think I’m going to start from there.

I feel quite wary about this new Audacity file format now…

I have PM’d you the link to the recovered? raw audio.

Others have had good luck not using Google Drive on an active project. :smiley: Personally, I am not fond of the old structure - it had its own issues. :wink:

Thank you!

I’m curious why the aup files wind up so large. This 250MB of audio is creating a 1.5GB aup file. It doesn’t seem to make sense. It does the same outside of a Google Drive folder.