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LibreOffice - any way to recover not saved changes to the file?
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Juan R.D. Silva
Sep 12, 2022, 7:00:05 PM9/12/22
to
I edited a file for hours and then mistakenly clicked "Do not save"
while closing file. Auto save is not enabled. No backup exist in
LibreOffice Backup folder. The computer is not restarted yet. Temp
folder have only old version. Any way to recover the lost edited
version? Or the only option to suffer the lost and to start all over again?
Appreciate any help.
Thanks
while closing file. Auto save is not enabled. No backup exist in
LibreOffice Backup folder. The computer is not restarted yet. Temp
folder have only old version. Any way to recover the lost edited
version? Or the only option to suffer the lost and to start all over again?
Appreciate any help.
Thanks
Peter Hillier-Brook
Sep 12, 2022, 8:30:05 PM9/12/22
to
I learned this lesson the hard way and began saving after every
paragraph. It's not hard to do and consumes very little time, or effort.
Peter HB
PS The LibreOffice Users list might be a more useful residence for this
type of query.
<us...@libreoffice.org>
songbird
Sep 13, 2022, 3:00:05 PM9/13/22
to
it while you still have the work in your noodle.
also, turn on auto save.
songbird
Juan R.D. Silva
Sep 13, 2022, 3:50:05 PM9/13/22
to
> (short answer) No. Its more like "shit happens!"
It does indeed :-(
> Even with best of knowledge and abilities, what once was in memory (RAM)
> will be reused pretty quick, and if you chose to not autosave regularly,
> there won't be much left, and even if there would be, the work to get it
> into proper shape might easily exceed the amount of work to recreate it.
It was my wild guess as well :-). Posted the question any way out of
disperation :-)
>It is in your memory - in one form or another...
This was a good one :-) I'm an older fellow. :-)
> So for now: Take advantage of "short term memory" and things like that.
> For the future, you might invite different consequences. You could think
> again about the autosave feature.
I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I
used not to care. Looks like now I want to enable it. :-)
>
> And finally: You could fight the rising of bad habits (like
> involuntarily clicking on warning boxes, or such...) because - as we
> know - the PEBCAK.
In my case it was the bad mouse with jumping cursor. Logitec certainly.
Now I'm going to replace it.
> To me, your question does ressemble - in some way - to the guy, who
> would like to undo his divorce, while not wanting to change its behavior
> towards members of the other sex. Not much, you can do, but remorse. ;-)
This one is even better that the first above. :-)
Thanks for you time. Oh, I did recreated it. And I even think is very
close to original. :-)
It does indeed :-(
> Even with best of knowledge and abilities, what once was in memory (RAM)
> will be reused pretty quick, and if you chose to not autosave regularly,
> there won't be much left, and even if there would be, the work to get it
> into proper shape might easily exceed the amount of work to recreate it.
It was my wild guess as well :-). Posted the question any way out of
disperation :-)
>It is in your memory - in one form or another...
This was a good one :-) I'm an older fellow. :-)
> So for now: Take advantage of "short term memory" and things like that.
> For the future, you might invite different consequences. You could think
> again about the autosave feature.
I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I
used not to care. Looks like now I want to enable it. :-)
>
> And finally: You could fight the rising of bad habits (like
> involuntarily clicking on warning boxes, or such...) because - as we
> know - the PEBCAK.
In my case it was the bad mouse with jumping cursor. Logitec certainly.
Now I'm going to replace it.
> To me, your question does ressemble - in some way - to the guy, who
> would like to undo his divorce, while not wanting to change its behavior
> towards members of the other sex. Not much, you can do, but remorse. ;-)
This one is even better that the first above. :-)
Thanks for you time. Oh, I did recreated it. And I even think is very
close to original. :-)
local10
Sep 14, 2022, 3:40:05 AM9/14/22
to
Sep 13, 2022, 19:47 by juan.r....@gmail.com:
> I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I used not to care. Looks like now I want to enable it. :-)
>
I actually have it disabled on purpose. The reason is I don't always want changes to be autosaved because sometimes the changes make the document worse. I wonder if there's some change tracking option in LO that would allow to see how the document developed over time.
Regards,
> I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I used not to care. Looks like now I want to enable it. :-)
>
Regards,
Curt
Sep 14, 2022, 5:40:05 AM9/14/22
to
On 2022-09-13, DdB <debia...@potentially-spam.de-bruyn.de> wrote:
> DdB
>
I thought he was going to say the rewrite was an *improvement*.
I think it was Hemingway's first wife that lost all his writing one time
at the Gare de Lyon (the manuscripts were in a big *malle* she had with
her that she somehow lost track of).
I don't remember how long the marriage lasted after that incident.
> Am 13.09.2022 um 21:47 schrieb Juan R.D. Silva:
>> Oh, I did recreated it. And I even think is very close to original. :-)
>
> This is good news! Thanks for sharing it. :-)
>> Oh, I did recreated it. And I even think is very close to original. :-)
>
> DdB
>
I thought he was going to say the rewrite was an *improvement*.
I think it was Hemingway's first wife that lost all his writing one time
at the Gare de Lyon (the manuscripts were in a big *malle* she had with
her that she somehow lost track of).
I don't remember how long the marriage lasted after that incident.
Chris Mitchell
Sep 23, 2022, 9:00:06 AM9/23/22
to
On Wed, 14 Sep 2022 09:37:14 +0200 (CEST)
local10 <loc...@tutanota.com> wrote:
> I actually have it disabled on purpose. The reason is I don't always
> want changes to be autosaved because sometimes the changes make the
> document worse. I wonder if there's some change tracking option in LO
> that would allow to see how the document developed over time.
If you check the checkbox found at:
local10 <loc...@tutanota.com> wrote:
> I actually have it disabled on purpose. The reason is I don't always
> want changes to be autosaved because sometimes the changes make the
> document worse. I wonder if there's some change tracking option in LO
> that would allow to see how the document developed over time.
Edit → Track Changes → Record
it will do exactly that.
Note that it records a *lot* of detail, and can bloat the file size
if the edit history gets long.
Personally, I store most of my documents in a Syncthing share and have
the server-side Syncthing instance set to retain the last 'n' versions
of the file. Each autosave is a new 'version', so there's a balance
between autosave frequency and number of retained versions. Eg autosave
every 30 minutes, retain last 10 versions, that allows 5
hours of continuous working before the state of the file before I sat
down to start the day gets pushed off the stack.
If you want to go all in on "how the document developed over time" and
are comfortable with git, I gather it's possible to set up git hooks
that will unpack the compressed odt file on the fly and commit the
version-able, diff-able contents to a git repo, and vice versa. This
would enable true version control, including branching, tagged release
versions, and so forth. I've never tried this, and can't vouch for how
smoothly it works in practice.
Cheers!
-Chris
piorunz
Sep 23, 2022, 9:30:05 AM9/23/22
to
On 13/09/2022 20:47, Juan R.D. Silva wrote:
> I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I
> used not to care. Looks like now I want to enable it. 😄
> I was pissed off to find out that autosave is desabled by default. I
Same! I just realized that AutoRecovery is disabled by default, and
backup copy feature is also disabled by default. Now I enabled them.
But one feature which is built in regardless of these two options is to
recover after crash/reboot, this always worked without touching any options.
Now I have triple defences, built in recovery, AutoRecovery every 10
minutes and backup copy. :)
--
With kindest regards, Piotr.
⢀⣴⠾⠻⢶⣦⠀
⣾⠁⢠⠒⠀⣿⡁ Debian - The universal operating system
⢿⡄⠘⠷⠚⠋⠀ https://www.debian.org/
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Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ
Sep 23, 2022, 8:40:05 PM9/23/22
to
did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also the
document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I experienced this
behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say anger).
So beware: If you get the warning that the backup copy cannot be
written, then save your document in another way. E.g. ctrl-a and paste
it into an editor or whatever so at least you have your text safe even
without the formatting and whatnot.
This is a very silly behaviour of LibreOffice. If the backup copy cannot
be written but the document can be written - why not at least save the
document before closing the LibreOffice Writer?
After this experience I disabled backup copies because it is even more
dangerous than working without backup copies. The reasons why backup
copies sometimes cannot be written is very obscure. It seems to be a
hickup of KDE which affects LibreOffice because similar things happen
sometimes with Okular which sometimes is unable to write its tmp files.
With kind regards
Eike
--
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ / ZP6CGE
piorunz
Sep 24, 2022, 12:20:05 AM9/24/22
to
On 24/09/2022 01:38, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also the
> document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I experienced this
> behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say anger).
I never used Backup copy feature, I just enabled it. Its doing no harm,
> did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also the
> document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I experienced this
> behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say anger).
right? I never relied on this feature because I never used it.
I intend to rely on normal file save as a first thing, then on built-in
recovery in case of reboots (I use Debian Testing and these happens when
GPU driver freezes, LibreOffice always recover opened files without
fail). As a third thing and last thing I will rely on backup copy
feature which I never used.
Additionally, selected important files are synced via SyncThing with one
year of versioning history.
> So beware: If you get the warning that the backup copy cannot be
> written, then save your document in another way. E.g. ctrl-a and paste
> it into an editor or whatever so at least you have your text safe even
> without the formatting and whatnot.
>
> This is a very silly behaviour of LibreOffice. If the backup copy cannot
> be written but the document can be written - why not at least save the
> document before closing the LibreOffice Writer?
experienced read-only tmp folder or LibreOffice being unable to save file.
> After this experience I disabled backup copies because it is even more
> dangerous than working without backup copies. The reasons why backup
> copies sometimes cannot be written is very obscure. It seems to be a
> hickup of KDE which affects LibreOffice because similar things happen
> sometimes with Okular which sometimes is unable to write its tmp files.
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ
Sep 24, 2022, 6:50:05 AM9/24/22
to
On Samstag, 24. September 2022 00:11:01 -04 piorunz wrote:
> On 24/09/2022 01:38, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also
> > the document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I
> > experienced this behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say
> > anger).
>
> I never used Backup copy feature, I just enabled it. Its doing no
> harm, right? I never relied on this feature because I never used it.
>
The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup copy
> On 24/09/2022 01:38, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also
> > the document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I
> > experienced this behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say
> > anger).
>
> I never used Backup copy feature, I just enabled it. Its doing no
> harm, right? I never relied on this feature because I never used it.
>
cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the original.
The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup copy" but it does
not tell you that it will not even write the original, even if that
*could* be written.
All the best
Eike
--
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ / ZP6CGE
Ag. Molas Lopez
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ / ZP6CGE
Casilla de Correo 13005
01726 Asuncion / Paraguay
SIPgate: +49-4131-9279632
Land-line: +595-21-553984
Cell-phone: +595-971-696909
Skype: eikelan
Signal: zp6cge Eike Lantzsch
WIRE: @eikelantzsch
piorunz
Sep 24, 2022, 11:00:05 AM9/24/22
to
On 24/09/2022 11:43, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup copy
> cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the original.
> The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup copy" but it does
> not tell you that it will not even write the original, even if that
> *could* be written.
That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To the
> The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup copy
> cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the original.
> The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup copy" but it does
> not tell you that it will not even write the original, even if that
> *could* be written.
same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor writes
backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
Charles Curley
Sep 24, 2022, 11:30:05 AM9/24/22
to
On Sat, 24 Sep 2022 15:50:04 +0100
piorunz <pio...@gmx.com> wrote:
> On 24/09/2022 11:43, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
>
> > The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup
> > copy cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the
> > original. The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup
> > copy" but it does not tell you that it will not even write the
> > original, even if that *could* be written.
>
> That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
> the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
> writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
~/.config/libreoffice/4/user/backup/
piorunz <pio...@gmx.com> wrote:
> On 24/09/2022 11:43, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
>
> > The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup
> > copy cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the
> > original. The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup
> > copy" but it does not tell you that it will not even write the
> > original, even if that *could* be written.
>
> That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
> the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
> writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
Incidentally, it won't hurt to prune those files occasionally.
--
Does anybody read signatures any more?
https://charlescurley.com
https://charlescurley.com/blog/
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ
Sep 24, 2022, 11:30:05 AM9/24/22
to
At the moment I do not recall the default. I put them into
/home/username/tmp
after the disaster which I experienced once.
It is not LibreOffice that is to blame, I think, but KDE in my case. Maybe
if working with Gnome it wouldn't happen. I don't know.
There is an edge case in KDE which impedes sometimes the write of temp
files no matter where you put them. It is difficult to reproduce. It does
not have to do with file ownership or the destination being writable.
I tried all that.
It is a real malfunction - "mal funktioniert's und mal nicht" in German.
The part for which I do blame LibreOffice is that, if unable to save the
backup copy, it ought to write the original if that can be written at
all - which in my case *is possible* even when the temp-file-problem
happens.
Cheers
Eike
piorunz
Sep 24, 2022, 12:00:05 PM9/24/22
to
On 24/09/2022 16:27, Charles Curley wrote:
>> That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
>> the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
>> writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
>
> ~/.config/libreoffice/4/user/backup/
>
> Incidentally, it won't hurt to prune those files occasionally.
Thanks. Exactly, that's what I found in LO settings after Eike post. I
>> That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
>> the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
>> writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
>
> ~/.config/libreoffice/4/user/backup/
>
> Incidentally, it won't hurt to prune those files occasionally.
will leave them in this location, my /home folder does not malfunction,
like never, so I don't expect this to fail.
Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ
Sep 24, 2022, 12:50:06 PM9/24/22
to
On Samstag, 24. September 2022 11:27:24 -04 Charles Curley wrote:
> On Sat, 24 Sep 2022 15:50:04 +0100
>
> piorunz <pio...@gmx.com> wrote:
> > On 24/09/2022 11:43, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > > The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup
> > > copy cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the
> > > original. The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup
> > > copy" but it does not tell you that it will not even write the
> > > original, even if that *could* be written.
> >
> > That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
> > the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
> > writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
>
> ~/.config/libreoffice/4/user/backup/
That's like Camelot - "Let's not go there. It's a silly place."
> On Sat, 24 Sep 2022 15:50:04 +0100
>
> piorunz <pio...@gmx.com> wrote:
> > On 24/09/2022 11:43, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > > The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup
> > > copy cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the
> > > original. The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup
> > > copy" but it does not tell you that it will not even write the
> > > original, even if that *could* be written.
> >
> > That's very interesting. Where does backup copy is being written? To
> > the same folder where original supposed to be? Like Kate text editor
> > writes backups as "filename.txt~" in the same folder?
>
> ~/.config/libreoffice/4/user/backup/
Under ~/.config there ought to be config files - not backup files. But just
my personal opinion. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder ...
>
> Incidentally, it won't hurt to prune those files occasionally.
+1
> Incidentally, it won't hurt to prune those files occasionally.
All the best
Eike
David Wright
Sep 24, 2022, 2:10:05 PM9/24/22
to
On Sat 24 Sep 2022 at 06:43:03 (-0400), Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> On Samstag, 24. September 2022 00:11:01 -04 piorunz wrote:
> > On 24/09/2022 01:38, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > > did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also
> > > the document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I
> > > experienced this behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say
> > > anger).
> >
> > I never used Backup copy feature, I just enabled it. Its doing no
> > harm, right? I never relied on this feature because I never used it.
> >
> The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup copy
> cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the original.
> The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup copy" but it does
> not tell you that it will not even write the original, even if that
> *could* be written.
It's odd: virtually all the software I use (eg emacs, gnumeric,
> On Samstag, 24. September 2022 00:11:01 -04 piorunz wrote:
> > On 24/09/2022 01:38, Eike Lantzsch KY4PZ wrote:
> > > did you realize that, if the backup copy fails for any reason, also
> > > the document cannot be saved and thus *all* work is lost? I
> > > experienced this behaviour recently to my dismay (not to say
> > > anger).
> >
> > I never used Backup copy feature, I just enabled it. Its doing no
> > harm, right? I never relied on this feature because I never used it.
> >
> The problem is: if you enabled it and for some reason the backup copy
> cannot be written, LibreOffice also does not write the original.
> The warning LibreOffice emits is: "Cannot write backup copy" but it does
> not tell you that it will not even write the original, even if that
> *could* be written.
inkscape, even mutt) modifies either the title bar or a status bar
as soon as I make any modification of a document (typically an
asterisk), and removes it if I revert the change, or save it.
I can't see any such indication in LO, and I did try reverting a
change to one cell in a spreadsheet, and when I quit with ^Q, it
asked if I wanted to Save the document even though it was unaltered.
Not being a DE user, I don't know whether this is typical of software
more closely associated with DEs. Is the feature missed by users?
Cheers,
David.
Curt
Sep 24, 2022, 3:40:06 PM9/24/22
to
On 2022-09-24, David Wright <deb...@lionunicorn.co.uk> wrote:
>
> It's odd: virtually all the software I use (eg emacs, gnumeric,
> inkscape, even mutt) modifies either the title bar or a status bar
> as soon as I make any modification of a document (typically an
> asterisk), and removes it if I revert the change, or save it.
lowriter puts an asterisk on the floppy drive icon (saves when you click
>
> It's odd: virtually all the software I use (eg emacs, gnumeric,
> inkscape, even mutt) modifies either the title bar or a status bar
> as soon as I make any modification of a document (typically an
> asterisk), and removes it if I revert the change, or save it.
it) that sits on the taskbar.
> I can't see any such indication in LO, and I did try reverting a
> change to one cell in a spreadsheet, and when I quit with ^Q, it
> asked if I wanted to Save the document even though it was unaltered.
>
> Not being a DE user, I don't know whether this is typical of software
> more closely associated with DEs. Is the feature missed by users?
>
> Cheers,
> David.
>
>
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