[su_note note_color=”#ec2310″ text_color=”#f8f4f4″]Working on {evo} configuration files outside of Dashboard can cause serious problems.[/su_note]
Facilities are provided within the Dashboard application to work with various configuration items such as Form Types, Server Tasks, etc, and these include the ability to copy them within the same machine to provide a duplicate, or to copy from one machine to another in case you need to distribute the file (which is normally done by export/import rather than copy/paste). These built-in facilities in Dashboard are the only approved way in which to carry out those actions.
Copying, moving or deleting files in the configuration folder by other means such as using Windows Explorer or a command prompt is absolutely not approved and is extremely likely to cause problems. When you use the export/import or copy/paste/clone/delete facilities in Dashboard, a number of special processes are automatically carried out in relation to security, linking between various configuration files, identifying the machine on which a file was created, tracking which files exist, and so on. If you simply move, copy or delete a file in the configuration folder using a normal file manager or command prompt, none of those special processes will be carried out and there is a very high probability that either immediately or at some point later this will cause serious problems, up to and including loss of data and/or the entire installation becoming unusable.
Also, a file being deleted or copied outside of Dashboard may actually be in use by the Configuration Manager service at the time, so the attempted action may fail altogether anyway, or in the case of a file copy the copied file may not be intact (this won’t happen when you use the facilities within Dashboard as they make sure the file isn’t in use before doing anything like a copy or delete).