Backing up SPIKE Prime Files

BACKING UP SPIKE PRIME FILES

PRIMELESSONS.ORG

Written by:

Manjiri McCoy and Bruce Schafer

Backing up SPIKE Prime Files

Authors: Manjiri McCoy and Bruce Schafer

Table of Contents

Why Should you Backup your Files? 1

Backing up on an iPad 1

Google Drive setup: 1

Files setup: 2

Backing up files: 2

Restoring Files 4

Backing up on a Mac Laptop 4

Google Drive setup: 4

Backup 4

Restoring Files 4

Backing up on a Chromebook 4

Why Should you Backup your Files?

Spike Prime program files have an extension “.llsp”. It is a good idea to back up files somewhere

other than your iPad/laptop in case something happens to your device and you lose your files.

This happens to teams every single year and they lose months of work and it is very sad.

NOTE: You cannot copy files from your Hub to your iPad/laptop. The hub contains compiled

code (machine language) and is not a human-readable program.

Backing up on an iPad

You need the Google Drive app and the Files app to back up your programs to Google Drive.

Google Drive setup:

1. From the Appstore, download and install the Google Drive App. It is published by Google

and is safe.

2. Log into the app. Create a new folder called “Spike Prime” by clicking the “+” icon in the

bottom right.

Files setup:

1. From the App Store, download and install the Files app. It is published by Apple and is

safe.

2. Launch the app. On the right, in the side bar under “Locations”, you’ll see a notification

to allow Google Drive as a recognized Location for files. Turn it on. Now Google Drive

should be a recognized location.

Backing up files:

1. Select “On My iPad” from the Locations sidebar. You will see folders in the main panel,

one of which is Spike

2. Click on Spike, and then on Lego Education Spike. You will see a list of .llsp files. These

are your programs.

3. Click the “Select” link at the top right. Select the programs you want to back up

4. Click the “share” link in the bottom bar.

5. Scroll the available programs until you find Google Drive. Click it.

6. On the window that appears, click “My Drive” near the bottom, Then pick the “Spike

Prime” folder.

7. When you’re in the folder, click the “Create Folder” icon at the top right. Make a new

folder with today’s date starting with year YYYY/MM/DD. E.g. 2021/10/25

ALWAYS make a new folder when you have made changes to a program and are saving

it for a second or more time. This way you can go back to an earlier version of your

program if needed.

8. Once the folder is created, click the “Save here” link at the bottom right. You will be

taken back to the main window.

9. Upload the selected files by clicking the “Upload” link at the top right.

Your programs are now saved to Google Drive.

Restoring Files

1. In the Files app, go to Google Drive and navigate to the filter that contains your file.

2. Press the file and drag it over “On My iPad” on the Locations bar. Keep the file pressed.

3. The folder will open. With the file still pressed, move over the Spike Folder. It will open.

4. Move over the Lego Education Spike Folder. It will open.

5. Now drop the file in here. You can replace an existing file or save as a new copy. They

will now be available in your projects when you open your App.

Backing up on a Mac Laptop

On a Mac laptop, the .llsp program files are stored in one of two locations:

1. ~/Library/Containers/Spike/Data/Documents/LEGO Education SPIKE/

2. ~/Documents

Google Drive setup:

1. Go to Google Drive.

2. Create a new folder called “Spike Prime”

Backup

1. Open Finder app

2. From the toolbar, click Go-> Go to folder and the copy-paste the first location listed

above in the text box

3. You should see your .llsp files. If what you’re looking for is not there, try the second

location.

4. Open a browser window and go to Google Drive, to the Spike Prime folder

5. Make a new folder with today’s date starting with year YYYY/MM/DD. E.g. 2021/10/25

ALWAYS make a new folder when you have made changes to a program and are saving

it for a second or more time. This way you can go back to an earlier version of your

program if needed.

6. Drag and drop files from your Finder Window to the Drive folder

Restoring Files

6. Open Google Drive in a browser and go to the folder that has your backed up file

7. Open Finder and navigate to the first location under the Library folder.

8. Drag and drop files from Drive to the folder. They will now be available in your projects

when you open your App.

Backing up on a Chromebook

Exporting Projects from SPIKE Prime

The Chromebook version of the SPIKE Prime application does not store your Word Block

projects in a standard place on the Chromebook. Instead it provides a way to “share” your

projects which is really a way of saving a copy of a project as a file on your computer. To access

this feature go to your My Projects screen to get a list of all your projects. Normally your

projects will be displayed as a set of large icons that are miniature copies of your programs. If

you prefer a tabular click on the small icon in the upper right. To return to the graphical

display click on the icon. To save a copy of one of your projects click on a small circle next

to the particular project. This should cause the circle to turn blue and the word “Share” to the

left of the icons we just discussed will become darker. Note, however, that if you select more

than one project, the “Share” will not become darker because you can only share or save one

file at a time.

Clicking on the “Share” menu item to bring up a file manager window. Don’t be surprised if

nothing happens as you may not have a compatible file manager set up. In that case you’ll need

to install one by using the following steps:

1. Minimize your SPIKE Prime application.

2. Start the Play Store application.

3. Search for Total Commander. (There are probably other file managers that will work but

this is the one we’ll use in these instructions.)

4. Click on Install and wait until the installation has completed.

5. Return to the your SPIKE Prime application’s My Projects screen

6. Reselect a project.

7. Click on Share.

The Total Commander window should show “Save File As” at the top followed by the name of

the project you chose followed by “.llsp” which is the extension that SPIKE Prime uses for its

Word Blocks project files. The first time you do this you probably won’t have a folder set up on

your Chromebook for you project files. To create a folder for your backup copies of your

projects, use the following steps:

1. Click on the line that includes “My files”.

2. Click on the icon that looks like a folder with a “+” sign. You should see a box that says

“Create new folder:” followed by a line to fill in with the name of a new folder. Try typing

“My Projects” or something similar.

3. If it doesn’t let you type anything on the line, click on the white box below which will

copy the words in the box onto the line. Replace the words with something like. “My

Projects”.

4. Click OK. This will return you to the “Save File As” screen.

Click OK to save the project you selected earlier. This will return you to the My Projects screen in

your SPIKE Prime application. You can now select a different project and then click on Share.

This time you won’t need to create a folder. Instead you should see the folder you created

earlier shown on a line under the name of your project file. If it isn’t, you can click on the three

dots to the right of the blue arrow under that line to navigate to your folder.

Backing Up SPIKE Prime Project Files

The process above will give you backup copies of your files on your Chromebook but will not

assure you have a backup if your Chromebook should fail.. To backup your project files to the

“cloud” use the Chrome browser to navigate to “drive.google.com” and use the “+ New” button

to upload your files. Instead of using Google Drive via your browser, you could use Play Store to

install Google Drive on your Chromebook and use it to upload your project files.

You can also backup your files to an external device. For instance, you can copy the files to a

USB drive.

Restoring a Project

Later, if you need to restore one of the projects from a backup copy, use Total Commander or

another Chromebook file manager to navigate to your My Projects folder and double click on

the backup file. Doing so will load it into the SPIKE Prime application and display it.

Transfering a Project to Another Computer

If you want to move the files to a Windows or Mac computer, you should copy or download

them and move them to the LEGO Education SPIKE folder in the Documents folder. Once you

have placed project files from your Chromebook in one of these folders, you’ll need to import

them into SPIKE Prime by displaying one of the projects already on that computer and then

using the File Open feature to load the project. After you have loaded it this way once, it will

appear with the rest of the projects on the My Projects screen.

If you want to move the files to a different Chromebook, copy or download them to the

Chromebook and then use the steps under “Restoring a Project”.