Recovering a document

E

esselte

I was typing some work on microsoft works word processor when my computer
crashed. I started my computer up again, however I did not save my work. Is
there any way of getting it back?
 
L

little_creature

Hi, could you kindly indicate which OS system do you use? Sometimes some
very desperate people tends to post here even if they have PC.
OK on my mac OSX and office 2004 some temp file are store here:
home>document>microsoft user data. The file names are coded so you have to
try and open them to see what's inside. Hope you will find what you lost
there.
 
E

esselte

Thanks for replying.I microsoft XP

little_creature said:
Hi, could you kindly indicate which OS system do you use? Sometimes some
very desperate people tends to post here even if they have PC.
OK on my mac OSX and office 2004 some temp file are store here:
home>document>microsoft user data. The file names are coded so you have to
try and open them to see what's inside. Hope you will find what you lost
there.
 
L

little_creature

Ok, then have a look here:
Document&settings>user name>local settings>temp
you can go there directly from start>run and type there %temp% and hit enter
and have a look there. But here, you are in mac section so I would also
advice you to visit microsoft.public .word section.
Good luck!

Thanks for replying.I microsoft XP

-
 
L

little_creature

you might also try to search your computer (start>search/find) for *.asd
which are auto saved documents. Make sure you include also hidden and system
files. If you will not find your document, I'm sorry it's gone. But you
might try to go to Pc word section and place your question there.
 
M

Michel Bintener

Hi,

I should probably point out that this is the Word for Macintosh newsgroup.
You were fortunate enough to run into little_creature, who also knows about
the Windows version, but generally speaking, your chances of getting an
answer are higher if you post in the Word for Windows newsgroup. Also, you
mention "Microsoft Works"; are you using Word, or is it really Works? Those
are different programs that behave quite differently, too.


I was typing some work on microsoft works word processor when my computer
crashed. I started my computer up again, however I did not save my work. Is
there any way of getting it back?

--
Michel Bintener
Microsoft MVP
Office:Mac (Entourage & Word)

***Always reply to the newsgroup.***
 
L

little_creature

I'm sorry I omit the word Works, all my tread were for Word... which as
indicated bellow is quite different. Sorry

Michel Bintener said the following on 3.10.2006 20:08:
 
J

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]

Hi Little Creature:

Not necessarily so. In Windows XP there are two versions of Works. One
uses the full version of Word as its word-processor. So he still could be
using Word.

However, the answer is "If you didn't save it, it has gone."

Go to Tools>Options>Save and set "Always make backup" to ON, and "Save
autorecover information every..." to 10 minutes. If you do, NEXT time this
happens, there will be something to recover, and chances are Word will
recover it automatically for you.

Cheers


I'm sorry I omit the word Works, all my tread were for Word... which as
indicated bellow is quite different. Sorry

Michel Bintener said the following on 3.10.2006 20:08:

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410
 
C

CyberTaz

Just one footnote to John's excellent advice...

IIRC, even the "Backup" (& AutoRecover as well?) does you no good until you
SAVE a new file at least *once*. You might consider developing the habit of
naming & saving a new file *before* you start to type... It's too easy to
get "caught up" in your work once you get started :)

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
 
J

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]

Hi Bob:

Backup does no good unless you SAVE. Correct.

AutoRecover saves to a temporary file regardless of whether the user saves
or not.

AutoRecover is not a backup, however, it saves only the changes to the file.
If the file has never been saved, the AutoRecover contains the whole
document; however:

It's useless unless Word actually crashes. If Word crashes, the recovered
documents will be automatically presented at next restart. If the user
closed Word without saving, there is no way to retrieve the AutoRecover
information. Word deletes it during startup!

Which I regard as an EXTREMELY SILLY DESIGN BUG!! And I have been known to
make this "suggestion" to Microsoft -- oh, about twice a year for the past
ten years :)

Cheers


Just one footnote to John's excellent advice...

IIRC, even the "Backup" (& AutoRecover as well?) does you no good until you
SAVE a new file at least *once*. You might consider developing the habit of
naming & saving a new file *before* you start to type... It's too easy to
get "caught up" in your work once you get started :)

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410
 
C

CyberTaz

AutoRecover saves to a temporary file regardless of whether the user saves
or not.

I wasn't completely certain of that on the PC, but thought it might be the
case. I knew it worked that way on the Mac.

One point confuses me, though... When you say:
Word deletes it during startup!

I was under the impression that the temp file was deleted when you *close*
the doc it pertained to or on Quitting Word appropriately. It seems that if
the temps are there on _startup_ that they would all be presented as
recovered files every time Word is launched. Curious‽

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac
 
J

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]

Hi Bob:

I dimly remember that it cleans up on Startup, but I wouldn't swear to it.

I seem to remember that on shutdown, Word sets a flag to say "I shut down
gracefully". On crash, that flag is not set.

On startup, Word checks for the "Ended Normally" flag. If it's there, it
cleans up the temp files. If it's not, it then opens each temp file,
retrieves the document it applies to (if such a document exists) and
attempts to apply the contents of the temp file to the document and presents
the result as "Recovered".

It's a long time since I tried to get to the bottom of this, but that's what
I remember (so it could be wrong ... ) :)

Cheers

I wasn't completely certain of that on the PC, but thought it might be the
case. I knew it worked that way on the Mac.

One point confuses me, though... When you say:


I was under the impression that the temp file was deleted when you *close*
the doc it pertained to or on Quitting Word appropriately. It seems that if
the temps are there on _startup_ that they would all be presented as
recovered files every time Word is launched. Curious‽

Regards |:>)
Bob Jones
[MVP] Office:Mac

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410
 
C

CyberTaz

Hi John - Thanks for the insight. I don't argue the point, but I find it
surprising that the temp files get left behind after a normal shut-down.
During any given session with Word a user could open & reopen any number of
docs - literally hundreds - so having that many "flagged" temps on disk for
no good reason just seems incongruous... But then again, this is Word we're
dancing with, isn't it :-?

--
Regards |:>)
Bob J.
 
J

John McGhie [MVP - Word and Word Macintosh]

Hi Bob:

Welll..... One of us is going to have to set up a test and go look... I
vote YOU :)

Cheers


Hi John - Thanks for the insight. I don't argue the point, but I find it
surprising that the temp files get left behind after a normal shut-down.
During any given session with Word a user could open & reopen any number of
docs - literally hundreds - so having that many "flagged" temps on disk for
no good reason just seems incongruous... But then again, this is Word we're
dancing with, isn't it :-?

--

Please reply to the newsgroup to maintain the thread. Please do not email
me unless I ask you to.

John McGhie <[email protected]>
Microsoft MVP, Word and Word for Macintosh. Business Analyst, Consultant
Technical Writer.
Sydney, Australia +61 (0) 4 1209 1410
 

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