IPhone – Issue when syncing iPhone to iTunes when adding movies

In researching solutions, I found this discussion at apple.com in which somebody suggests "damaging" the iTunes library. This lead to a very useful post which discusses how iTunes uses the data it has to recreate what it doesn't have and gives instructions on how to damage (without deleting) the file -- spoiler: erase the data, leave the file.

Fortunately, I had backed up the iTunes files before I recreated the iTunes library.

I copied my backed up files back into the iTunes directory and launched iTunes and rebuilt what it needed to. There were no apps listed in the Apps display though.

When I connected my iPad, iTunes didn't complain about this being an unknown device. As it started to sync, it prompted my to transfer purchases (i.e. the apps on my iPad which didn't show in iTunes) -- but with no hint of having to erase anything. The sync took longer than normal, but everything is there and I can even find the songs which were originally hidden.

iPad is fine, will sync my wife's iPhone tonight.

Currently, there doesn't seem to be a way to prevent iTunes from pulling in the voice memos. The closest I've been able to figure would be to have a script or launchd item that simply removes anything that it sees. Preferable copying them to another directory for storage.

Update: October, 2017

I've switched to using Just Press Record which is dedicated to voice memos. It's fast to start and also creates transcripts. They're pretty good most of the time, but sometimes they get pretty far off. It's a nice feature, regardless.

The app costs a few bucks, but it's well worth it. (And, I like to support developers so they can keep working on software I like.)