Lost 4 Hours Of Work From Yesterday


HumbleChief
 Share

Recommended Posts

I heard before that you at least have to give the file a name for the archive system to work ?

 

 

use save as often 

sometimes every few minutes

certainly after finishing a task I don't want to repeat

 

each save as has the date and time in the file name

 

I don't use or rely on Chief's archive system

 

Lew

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, HumbleChief said:

With the settings below I have no useful archive of the work that was completed.

 

That may happen if you didn't give the Plan a name until the final save when you closed it .

 

The Archiving/Backup System doesn't work unless the File has a name , should be the 1st thing you do after open a new plan.....but likely you know that ....

 

So perhaps something else is up ? did you get the infamous error where Chief disappears off the Screen with your work and were not offered an opportunity to save?

 

I have seen this several times and there were no recoverable Archives either for some reason for that Session..... happens in both PC and MAC versions

 

https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-03049/troubleshooting-chief-architect-software-closing-unexpectedly-on-windows.html

 

https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-02940/troubleshooting-chief-architect-software-closing-unexpectedly-on-a-mac.html

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 minutes ago, Kbird1 said:

Forgot to mention that , although chief can't open .Undo.plan files you could perhaps ask Tech Support if they have a tool to do so ...

 

......If you have an Undo.plan file in the Undo folder?

 

Mick.

 

Undo files don't work that way.  Not only are they deleted as soon as the plan is closed, but they're also very small files.  Not sure exactly how they work, but they definitely don't contain the entire plan file.  I suspect they just store the operation along with instructions for Chief to reverse that operation. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

27 minutes ago, Alaskan_Son said:

 

Undo files don't work that way.  Not only are they deleted as soon as the plan is closed, but they're also very small files.  Not sure exactly how they work, but they definitely don't contain the entire plan file.  I suspect they just store the operation along with instructions for Chief to reverse that operation. 

 

 

The files are left behind quite often, especially if there is a crash or other issue... I was told some years back CA can't open them as the Header File is missing, but only Dermot perhaps could confirm that?  Just thought it maybe worth an ask..... if he has an Undo.plan and most often you don't, as mentioned.

 

But as you can see here from a plan I on worked on back in Nov. they are indeed left behind .........At 26mb I  would assume it is the Whole plan.....since the final plan was 19mb though I have no idea why some are 26mb and others are 7mb or even 2mb.

 

image.thumb.png.b33f87a7d9085b9d6d9278f5328b5a9d.png

  • Like 1
  • Upvote 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 12/10/2020 at 1:53 PM, Kbird1 said:

The files are left behind quite often, especially if there is a crash or other issue...

This may change things a bit with regard to what gets deleted since the program doesn't have a chance to finish running through it's normal order of operations. 

 

On 12/10/2020 at 1:53 PM, Kbird1 said:

At 26mb I  would assume it is the Whole plan.....since the final plan was 19mb though I have no idea why some are 26mb and others are 7mb or even 2mb.

Chief has changed the undo system over the years to speed things up.  I believe at one point they did essentially save the entire plan.  I believe the system now though only records the information necessary to reverse the last command.  This would explain why some Undo files are very small and others are quite large. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So Larry... In the Chief X12 Archives Folder, there was no recent data for this project?

 

In the past, I've rummaged through the Archives section, and sometimes a certain project has more than one folder. Sometimes there's a folder for the Layout only, and a separate one for plans... and then there's the combo folder which contains both layouts and plans. Don't know why this happens but it does. 

 

Anyway. my sympathies. It absolutely stinks when this happens.  Like DJP said... saving every so often along the work day day can be a good policy.    

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, VHampton said:

So Larry... In the Chief X12 Archives Folder, there was no recent data for this project?

 

In the past, I've rummaged through the Archives section, and sometimes a certain project has more than one folder. Sometimes there's a folder for the Layout only, and a separate one for plans... and then there's the combo folder which contains both layouts and plans. Don't know why this happens but it does. 

 

Anyway. my sympathies. It absolutely stinks when this happens.  Like DJP said... saving every so often along the work day day can be a good policy.    

Hey Val, been through these battles before and never really know what bites and why. There was indeed an archive folder with the correct 'saved as' name and a single archived plan, but not a recent enough one that had the previous work included, like it just arbitrarily stopped archiving and autosaving within the spec'd time interval. And yes, searched high and low for any archive in every folder including DropBox and Carbonite as I've found them in unexpected places in the past, but this time, nothing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That pretty much stinks. I've had that happen on occasion too. The auto-saved file was no where to be found. 

 

Regarding the solution, sometimes deleting the archive folders for that particular project creates a new folder which might behave better. 

 

Once the archives are gone, doing a 'save as' for both the plan and the layout should set things up again.

 

...As a safety precaution though, I usually set aside the best and most recent auto-saved files before doing this.  

 

Either way, DJP has some sage advise. Tapping on a dedicated hot key every so often is good practice.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks Val,

 

I think the thing that is most troubling is that there's a system and specification within Chief to auto save every (x) minutes, and archive hourly, without a warning or note that says none of this works if you don't hit cntrl 'S' every few seconds to save your work and it's not even a stretch to think that the archive and auto save features are there so one does not have to hit cntrl 'S' every few seconds and the illusion that the system will work gets even more complete when it actually does work 99.9% of the time. I've found archived files and auto sav and auto save bak files many times, just as expected. What happened this time? Dunno. Why weren't there auto saves every 5 minutes as spec'd in the dbx? Again dunno,  User error? Possible no doubt, but Chief's archive and auto save functions have been pretty darn reliable but every once and a while - ouch... Again more a reminder than a request for advice...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Stranger things do happen. Having the program just quit out of the blue is something that used to happen on occasion. That was back in the earlier days of X1 though. Usually memory related stuff when Chief evolved into a heavy weight in the drawing world, and needed some serious hardware to make it run.  

 

I remember when the plan files for each floor saved independently back in the days of the V versions - when we were lucky enough to have a computer with even 1 Gb of Ram. That was some organized chaos to put it mildly. 

 

Anyway... auto save is definitely a convenience, but there's nothing like doing self saves for good measure. Your story is definitely a cautionary tale for sure. Thanks for posting.  

 

Hope you have a wonderful holiday season, and an excellent New Year ahead. We could all use one.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A couple of my own observations.

1.  The Archives can be tough to read.  Sometimes I think I’ve lost a backup until I sort the files By Date and then start reading the names a lot more carefully.

2.  The little pop-up message you get when first opening your file after a program crash or unexpected shutdown can be super helpful.  When Chief tells you that it has a newer file than the one you saved, may be in your best interest to check it out.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, HumbleChief said:

And yes, searched high and low for any archive in every folder including DropBox and Carbonite as I've found them in unexpected places in the past,


This isn’t good—that you’re unsure and have to make guesses.  You should KNOW where these are being stored.  If you don’t, you should check your settings.  And if they’re nit saving to the appropriate folder, you should report to Chief.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

11 hours ago, Alaskan_Son said:


This isn’t good—that you’re unsure and have to make guesses.  You should KNOW where these are being stored.  If you don’t, you should check your settings.  And if they’re nit saving to the appropriate folder, you should report to Chief.

Difficult to summarize over 20 years of using Chief in a manner that is detailed enough to describe those 20 years of learning and understanding the nuances of Chief in posts here. There might have been a time within those 20 years where the archived files were saved to a different folder than where they should have been located and through those 20 years have figured things out. I do indeed know where they should be located and where they should be according to the current settings. Apologies for making it sound like that was/is not the case. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Whether it be a PC or Mac, there's always going to be the following folder, which contains the archive folders... which contains the back-ups for every project saved by Chief.

 

Chief Architect Premier X12 Data

 

I realize that you may know this already, but for anyone following along in the future, they should know that it's a very easy navigation process.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share