Frollocks

[jacey]

I just lost three scenes from the new ending of 'Empire of Dust' with a single careless click. All today's work, in fact. I thought I had Word set to save automatically every ten minutes... in fact I did... so WTF is it?

I hate bloody Microshaft. (Okay, it's my fault, but I still hate bloody Microshaft!)

Nuff said.

If anybody has a magic retrieval spell please let me know.

Comments

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Oh, dear. :(

I have to admit that I don't trust the autosave so I just press Ctrl S (or click the Save button on the toolbar) every time I pause for a moment to think.

It is pretty difficult to lose stuff in Word these days. I know some people like to condemn it, but I find it a useful all-round work horse of a word processor that does everything I need for producing handouts etc as well as fiction writing.

As to retrieving the lost scenes, it depends on what you actually did:

- if you think you deleted the file, it will be in the recycle bin and therefore retreivable.

- if you saved an old version over the top of the new version, there is nothing you can do, though Word will have warned you with a message something on the lines of: "A file of this name already exists. Overwrite Yes/No?" (The safe answer is usually "Aaarrgh! No!!!")

- if it was a brand new file that you hadn't yet given a name to, it's very likely been saved with a default name taken from the first few words of the document, or possibly as Document 1.doc in the default location (usually My Documents unless you've set it to something different). Try searching for all files created today with a .doc file extension.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Or (having now looked at the date/time you posted!) search for all files created yesterday with a .doc extension.

[birdsedge.livejournal.com]

I closed it down, thinking I had already saved what was there so I ignored the warning. Effectively I saved the old version on top of the new one. My fault.

I've rewritten one scene so far. I don't know whether it's as good, or better. It does the same thing, but it's a bit different.

The next scene I lost was a sex scene which I find difficult to write at the best of times, especially as it was a conflicted one.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

I ignored the warning

*Utters little moan of despair*

Nooooo! You really can trust Word on this one. You should never see that warning about overwriting files -- unless you're naming a file for the first time and have just happened to choose one that already exists. In that case, click the cancel button, check what files you already have and choose a slightly different name for the currently open file. Chapter 3a or something.

If you're just saving an update, use Ctrl S or click on the Save button on the toolbar and it will just keep using the same name and location.

The other warning you shouldn't ever ignore is the "Do you want to save changes?" The answer is almost always "Yes".

Ahem...

Sorry about the lecture, I just slipped into teacher mode for a moment there.

Commiserations on the lost sex scene. I know how awkward they are. :(

[birdsedge.livejournal.com]

Yes, Miss. Sorry, Miss. I won't let it happen again, Miss.
:-)

it was Just One Of Those Things. In my defence I do daft stuff like that fairly rarely. The only other time I lost anything was several years ago... a complete chapter... when a hard drive on a very old laptop failed irrevocably.

[heleninwales.livejournal.com]

Oh, God, yes! I think we've all done something stupid at one time or another. :) I lost almost a whole chapter once because I overwrote the file with a snippet of something else.

[green-knight.livejournal.com]

What I do is to set up a new document, save it, _and then_ work. At least I try to - I've done the 'what was this where should it go' dance too often.

[birdsedge.livejournal.com]

I'm very organised about where I save my files. I have subject-work directories rather than keeping things in the work directories designated for the programme. I can't understand people who just hit save and trust that the programme puts it somewhere sensible. That way lies madness.