Hatrack River Writers Workshop: Help me find a ghost

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Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

Any computer literate person that can help me. I have retrieved a large file from an email attachment, saved it, but didn't save it to a destination. C losed the file and now it is gone... I have run the search for the file name, but nothing? Operating system is xp. It's gone forever isn't it?

Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :

I usually find my downloaded stuff in the "HP Administrator's Documents," whatever that means. Certainly it's loaded up with a bunch of attachments I downloaded. I find it under "My Computer" in the menu. (I gather you're supposed to change "HP Administrator" to some system name that pleases you---I never bothered.)

Posted by Robert Nowall (Member # 2764) on :

Oh, yeah, "HP" is "Hewlett-Packard"---my computer's brand name. Whatever your brand name is, that's probably it.

Posted by Tiergan (Member # 7852) on :

Bent Tree,

If you did not save the file when you closed it, then any changes you made to the file are lost. You can retrieve the document from the original email, unless you have deleted the email. It is possible there might be something saved in a temporary file or folder. If it was a Microsoft word file, then go to Start -> Search -> For Files or Folders, Click on All Files and Folders. In the all or part of the file name field enter "*.doc" without the parentheses and then to narrow it down click on when was it modified and choose the most appropriate option. I hope this helps. Good Luck.

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

I'll give that a try. Tiergan, as you may have surmised, it is your file I seek

I know that I saved it on some level, but it didn't prompt me to save it when it was closed. I still have the original, but the changes may be gone, meaning I will have to start anew.

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

Now I remember why I got the laptop.

Posted by annepin (Member # 5952) on :

Don't you still have the email? Can't you just download it again?

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

Yeah but it was like eight chapters of a book with comments and edits.

Posted by KayTi (Member # 5137) on :

It will likely be in whatever "downloads" directory your email client downloads into.

This can be tricky to find, and I'm hoping one of the geekier among us pops in with some step-by-steps, but I suggest trying this...

Open ANOTHER email that has an attachment of the same type (e.g., MS Word if I am getting that right)
Open the attachment
See if you can tell what directory the file is saving into - might be able to tell when you open the attachment, might be able to tell by choosing "save as" from the menu and see what the system defaults to. It could default to your MS Word default save location, which may be different from your email client's default save location.

I use MS Outlook 2003 as my email client. I just opened a file from someone from a few weeks ago and launched it. I clicked "save as" and my system wants me to save the file into a directory called "OLK5F" which is oh-so-memorable and probably stands for "Outlook" or some such.

Clicking on the little arrow in the box above the file list, I see that this directory is located in the C:/Documents and Settings/MyUserName/Local Settings/Temporary Internet Files/OLK5F path.

Can you use that information to go a hunting on your machine and see if it's somewhere similar?

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

That is what I was hoping to figure out how to do. I use hotmail. I'll give that a try

Posted by annepin (Member # 5952) on :

Oh I see, you changed it and then saved it. It should be in your downloads or temp internet file. I assume you opened word again and went to your recently opened list (you can find it such a list in "documents" too. Tiergan's method should work.

Otherwise, I can't remember the exact path since I've been using MACs for a while, but go to Windows Explorer and look for a folder called "temp files" or "web downloads" or something like that. It's not going to have the same name--it will have a bunch of numbers or something, but it should have a time stamp next to it that will allow you to recognize as the correct file.

Posted by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (Member # 59) on :

My Windows XP lets me search for a file by "a word or phrase in the file" so yours should, too. Couldn't you pick something unique to your updated file and have it search on that?

Edited to add that you can have it search by the date you modified it as well.

[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited July 08, 2008).]

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

Thank you all. The ghost is gone. I appreciate all your help though.

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

That's a lot of hard work down the drain. That's tough.

One way to avoid that in the future would be to do all that work in a wiki. One really nice feature about wikis is that all revisions are saved and you can call any of them back and/or revert to any of the older versions at any time.

Okay, but how do you set one up? There are a number of free ones that you can run on your own computer or from the web, or from a USB stick. Google Dokuwiki, Tiddlywiki, etc.

If you decide you want to do that, but want some assistance, email me and I will try to help.

ALL my writing and revising/edits are now in a wiki. It was a pain to get it all in, but I am really glad I have it now.

Posted by Rommel Fenrir Wolf II (Member # 4199) on :

Try the Lenox operating system, I have it on another laptop and I can never lose anything unless I delete it.
It is free to download but takes some time to get use to it.

RFW2nd

Posted by Bent Tree (Member # 7777) on :

I'll look into that. I spent about six or seven hours redoing the work I lost.