Folder deletion behaviour in Frontpage

S

strongp

I was replacing placeholder images yesterday afternoon just prior to
publishing a site. Switching between Photoshop and FrontPage, I saw the
image to be replaced was highlighted, and hit the delete key. A
confirmation window popped up which I OK'd without reading (or
thinking).

Unfortunately while the graphic object was selected in the right hand
page of FP, the application focus was on my Images folder in the folder
list - I realised what had happened immediately because the web page
in the right pane immediately lost all the images.

Now at this point I wasn't worried. I'm a technical professional
and haven't suffered any data loss since two hard drives failed on me
within 12 hours back in 1993.

I started with CTRL-Z. No joy. I went to the recycle bin. Nothing
there. Then off to last night's backup - except that most of the
images had all been created or edited that day. I checked my browser
cache, but as these were local files I found nothing there. I was saved
a lot of work because I'd copied the web earlier in the day, and was
able to retrieve much of my work from that copy, and recreate the rest
in a couple of hours. So I only lost 3-4 hours of my evening - it
could have been worse.

So why am I boring you all?

Well, trawling the usenet I see I'm not the only one to have suffered
this. So here's an open question to Microsoft.

Is there any other desktop application in which data that was stored in
a persistent folder on a hard drive can be deleted without any chance
of recovery (as the default delete behaviour) or any option to undo?

As a seasoned programmer I find it hard to believe that this behaviour
has persisted in all versions of FrontPage (which I've been using
since v1.0b, and yet has never been reviewed. This is the sort of
destructive capability I'd expect to see in a hardcore sysadmin's
utility toolbox, not in a desktop web development tool....
 
A

Andrew Murray

If you delete files from within frontpage, they're gone for good - they
won't end up in the recycle bin etc.

But apparently *you* did delete the file - the message was probably "Are you
sure you want to delete this file? Y/N".
 
S

strongp

you're right, I'm not trying to say I'm not responsible for the
original screw up, but I'm pointing out that this behaviour is unique
among the office family of products, and I can't see any good reason
for this behaviour except for lazy programming. Perhaps MS have some
good reason for why this should happen - I'd love to know...
 
S

Steve Easton

It really isn't a FrontPage issue it's an operating system limitation.
The reason FrontPage does "not" use the recycle bin is because you can't
recycle across domains.
Since FrontPage can edit both local and remote webs it's impossible to have
it send files to recycle.

Nor can any other application recycle from one drive to another.

--
Steve Easton
Microsoft MVP FrontPage
95isalive
This site is best viewed............
........................with a computer
 
S

strongp

Steve,

Thanks for the response. I accept that as logical behaviour if I'm
working with remote webs, but I'd argue that when working on a local
web on my HD I'd expect the delete procedure to conform to normal
windows desktop behaviour. Moot point I suppose as FP is reaching the
end of ts life, but still...

Peter
 

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