yWriter files gone

[GE]

Yesterday, while working in a remote location my battery started to fade. I quickly tried to back up my files to a thumb drive but unfortunately the laptop turned off during the process. Today, I opened yWriter only to find that my project was  missing. I opened up the auto backup folder In tried to open a file. The screen is not populated with data. I can't figure this one out.

[Dave Shaw]

https://sites.google.com/site/ywritersj/faq/restoring-backups

If you have any questions about it, feel free to ask.

Dave Shaw

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From: GE <glenn.g...@gmail.com>
To: ywr...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wed, February 6, 2013 3:35:44 PM
Subject: [yWriter] yWriter files gone

[docmon]

This is perfect timing because I needed to access my backups last night. Except I wasn't able to access the latest version. 

I don't have my computer at the moment. But I read through the wiki, and it seems I did (last night) what it says to. I remember seeing the .lock file, so I'll have to try deleting that. 

I managed to open the Full Backup file. But it didn't have my latest work (though it was better than what I had). By the date stamp, the "Latest" files were the ones I needed: they were stamped 45 min. later, right before I closed. 

When I tried to open the other backup (Secondary? something like that) and the "Latest" backup, they would not open. The error message said the folder did not contain an RTF5 file/folder. 

I was opening these backups by directly opening the file, rather than going through the program and going to Restore. I just started using yWriter, so I don't really know my way around it yet. 

Any help in opening the Latest Backup would be appreciated. Thank you!

[GE]

Actually, the process has been taking care of. The answer is in the Comprehensive Help File. This error can happen when you turn your computer off or the battery dies while yWriter is backing up your files. The yw5 file becomes corrupt. Although, I did lose the work that I completed just before my battery went dead, I was able to reload my project. Thanks to the thought that Simon put into this program, my project has been saved. The comprehensive help file has many of the answers to most problems. It would be great if someone could organize the data. Thanks Simon, for all you do. You have increased the quality of life of thousands of writers around the world, something you should definitely be proud of.

[Dave Shaw]

Opening the .yw5 within the zip archive in Backups isn't something you should be doing.  As you've seen, it only works on full backups, the ones containing the entire project.  Opening such a backup with yWriter is rather problematic, as it doesn't realize that it's a backup and treats it as an active project, meaning it makes changes to the files in the backup.

Do you just want to look at a backup?  Or do you want to restore a copy of your project?  The wiki page I posted explains how to do a restore.

If you just want to browse previous versions of your scenes, one way is to open your project normally, then go to Tools => Backups => View Autobackups.  This will let you browse the previous versions of your changed scenes (note that this isn't the most polished function in yWriter).  Alternately, you can open the .rtf files within the zip archives with any rtf editor.  I don't recommend changing them, as that defeats the purpose of having them as backups.  You can also browse the .yw5 file using a text or XML editor.

So, it all comes back to what you want to do.  Tell us that and we can answer your questions better.

Thanks.

 

Dave Shaw

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From: docmon <docto...@gmail.com>
To: ywr...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Thu, February 7, 2013 3:22:23 PM
Subject: Re: [yWriter] yWriter files gone

[docmon]

Thanks for the info. I just started using yWriter this week. So it's all new to me. 

I had restored a backup, but my very latest work in one scene was missing. I did manage to find the RTF file today and copy and paste it back into my scene, since there wasn't much. 

One problem I still had was when I go to View Backups, I just get a blank window. When I click on any of the dates that appear, there is no text in the window. Nothing for me to look at at all. Anyone know a reason for that?

Thanks!

Monica

[Michelle Norton]

You cannot view the backups from ywriter. Open My Computer and navigate to Program Files/Spacejock/ywriter/Backups.

Then you'll see the zip files.

On Fri, Feb 8, 2013 at 2:44 PM, docmon <docto...@gmail.com> wrote:

One problem I still had was when I go to View Backups, I just get a blank window. When I click on any of the dates that appear, there is no text in the window. Nothing for me to look at at all. Anyone know a reason for that?

Thanks!

Monica

--
Michelle
Writer / Web Designer
http://michellejnorton.com
http://denverfictionwriters.com

[Dave Shaw]

??

Have you ever tried the option to view the backups?  It works for me, although again, it isn't very well polished, since Simon hasn't used it much.

 

Dave Shaw

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From: Michelle Norton <tirj...@gmail.com>
To: ywr...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Fri, February 8, 2013 5:18:42 PM

Subject: Re: [yWriter] yWriter files gone

[Dave Shaw]

I see blank folders for days when I opened the project but didn't make any changes.  On days when I wrote or edited scenes, I see the .rtf files for the previous versions of the scenes.

You should check your settings for the scene backups: Tools => Backups => Set scene editor Autobackup options.  Mine is set to Save backups to sequential files every 5 minutes.  Of course, this only applies if you use the yWriter scene editor - if you use your default rtf editor, you'll never get sequential scene backups.

 

Dave Shaw

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From: docmon <docto...@gmail.com>
To: ywr...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Fri, February 8, 2013 4:44:28 PM

Subject: Re: [yWriter] yWriter files gone