Track jobs in the Machine panel

Machine is where you can see what Merceq is doing in the background and which jobs are queued.

1. Click the Machine button in the top bar. It’s between Plugins and Settings.
2. Review ongoing tasks and their progress.
3. If a job is waiting for a source or destination disk, check which disk it needs.
4. Track Sense’s preparation and other background jobs here.

Here are some jobs you may see in Machine:

Message in Machine	What it means
Copying files to disk	Files on your phone or card are being copied to the disk you selected first.
Importing	Clips are being added to your Merceq library.
Exporting	Export is in progress. If another transfer is waiting, it says “{ad} — queued”.
Sense is understanding images / Sense is waiting	Sense is analysing your videos or waiting for a reason. Below, you can see “Step i / n” and “x / y clips” information.
Downloading Sense	Files needed for Sense are being downloaded. Progress is shown as “part i/n”.
Preparing previews	Cover images, frames shown while scrubbing with the mouse, and preview strips are being created.

If Sense is waiting, you can also see why:

Reason for waiting	What should you do?
battery below threshold	The battery has dropped below 20%. The job can continue when you plug in your Mac.
preview is open	You’re watching a clip with Space. Sense will resume when you close the preview.
transfer in progress	Waiting for the ongoing transfer to finish.
queued	Waiting for another job to finish.
resumes after the preview copy	A playback copy is being prepared for the video first.
turned off	Sense is off or paused.
resetting	Merceq is completing the reset.

If there are no tasks to run, no jobs appear in Machine. This isn’t an error; it means Machine is idle. If your library is empty too, you’ll see “No clips yet · Insert a card or drag in a folder.” and the Import… button. If disks containing some of your clips aren’t connected, the “{n} clips on a disconnected disk” warning may also appear.

Adding files and analysing their contents are different tasks. The fact that videos are starting to appear in your library doesn’t mean preparation for searching speech, images, or on-screen text is finished. These features become available as their relevant analyses are completed.