Header File Not Found

[ChiefMackDaddy]

There is a post reply from Chief Architect on File Header Not Found that I am hopeful is old. I saved my file last night, but did keep the program open.  This morning the program was closed so I went to reopen the file I saved last night, and get the error message File Header Not Found.  I researched the resolution, but it appears none exists and this is by design, WHICH IS NOT OK.  This sounds like a simple out of sync from file header next number to file detail next number to keep the header and detail files together.  If there is a resolution, please let me know.  Chief Architect, if there is no resolution except start over, so sorry for you customer, please read on, this is just simple 1990's level programming and you should do better at 199/mo.   

 

Have you guys updated your programming to be able to modify the header next number to the detail file next number so clients don't lose hours, weeks, months of data.  I'm finding myself in the same quandary as other customers.  I saved before going to bed last night, this morning, I try to open the file and get header cannot be found.  I went to research and found this article, which for this day and age and the price of your program, this is totally old school programming we had in the 90's and an old school answer.  You should be able to accept a users file, look at the next number of the detail file, then edit the header file number to match and allow the out of sync to go away giving a true result to the customer.  

 

My hope is this is a really old answer, and I can email my file that I have spent weeks working on and it will be usable.  The other thing I'm seeing is the auto save and file revision.  If you aren't going to make a way for header and detail files to be put back in sync, then at least do basic windows revisioning in your local drive so it shows when a user right clicks on the properties and clicks the versions tab, they can pull one of the last auto saved versions.  Again, we've had this for about 25 years now.  At $199/mo, this is very basic stuff that should be incorporated into the stability of your app.

 

Please let me know if there is any hope for my file giving the header not found error message, if there is not, please help future customers by looking at some standards in your programming.

[DBCooper]

According to Chief, that message means that the file is corrupt and there is nothing they can do to read it. Your best bet is to find a backup or archive file that is not corrupt.

 

Here is a recent post about the same problem:

 

[BenMerritt]

On 6/22/2024 at 8:02 AM, ChiefMackDaddy said:

This sounds like a simple out of sync from file header next number to file detail next number to keep the header and detail files together.

No; that's really not what's going on at all. Current versions of Chief Architect software store the entire plan in a single file; there aren't logically separate "files" inside. What the software does include in the header record is a short fixed data sequence labeling the file as a Chief Architect plan file. This is written at the very beginning of every plan file using simple, extremely well-tested code. There's nothing to get "out of sync" because we always write exactly the same sequence. If a file has a different sequence when read into the program, that means that it has become corrupted, almost certainly due to something outside of Chief Architect, such as a failing hard drive or a bug in a third-party cloud synchronization service. In nearly every case, the corruption actually extends well beyond the header record, rendering the file unrecoverable. This header verification technique is a common software engineering practice used in a wide variety of formats, including the widespread PDF format.

 

Corruption of a plan file is a deeply unfortunate situation, but there's no programming technique that can totally eliminate the risk of data loss, especially when it's due to something outside the software's control. To help reduce these kinds of issues, we recommend keeping regular backups of your files as outlined in this Knowledge Base article.

 

The good news is that you may not have to start entirely from scratch. Chief Architect periodically writes archival copies of the plan file as it's being worked on. You may be able to access and restore one of those archive files.

[ChiefMackDaddy]

7 hours ago, BenMerritt said:

No; that's really not what's going on at all. Current versions of Chief Architect software store the entire plan in a single file; there aren't logically separate "files" inside. What the software does include in the header record is a short fixed data sequence labeling the file as a Chief Architect plan file. This is written at the very beginning of every plan file using simple, extremely well-tested code. There's nothing to get "out of sync" because we always write exactly the same sequence. If a file has a different sequence when read into the program, that means that it has become corrupted, almost certainly due to something outside of Chief Architect, such as a failing hard drive or a bug in a third-party cloud synchronization service. In nearly every case, the corruption actually extends well beyond the header record, rendering the file unrecoverable. This header verification technique is a common software engineering practice used in a wide variety of formats, including the widespread PDF format.

 

Corruption of a plan file is a deeply unfortunate situation, but there's no programming technique that can totally eliminate the risk of data loss, especially when it's due to something outside the software's control. To help reduce these kinds of issues, we recommend keeping regular backups of your files as outlined in this Knowledge Base article.

 

The good news is that you may not have to start entirely from scratch. Chief Architect periodically writes archival copies of the plan file as it's being worked on. You may be able to acceaccess and restoress and restore one of those archive files.

Corruption of a plan file is a deeply unfortunate situation, but there's no programming technique that can totally eliminate the risk of data loss, especially when it's due to something outside the software's control. To help reduce these kinds of issues, we recommend keeping regular backups of your files as outlined in this Knowledge Base article.

I appreciate the 'corrupt' file approach, but that is why auto save and versioning is usually on these programs (not CAD) but this was my second comment above.  I saved the file, multiple times, but did not save as V1, V2, V3 because most programs have that function written into them.  I would advise your programmers on your next version, since corruption seems to be a topic I find on the internet for this software so much, to do this.  I assumed in 2024 it was part of the basic software since it became the norm about 15 years ago.  I lost weeks of work, I have saved the software, what I did not do was save it as different files because well, in the IT world we don't do that anymore, auto save versions are part of standard software so I never thought with this expensive of a software to do that.  I would def do a pop up or intro to your customers to state, we do not do versioning auto save, please save a file separate from the one you are working on to ensure if/when corruption occurs you have a backup.  I hate I did not know this but hefty lesson learned on my part, I will start saving a new file name daily as I work.

[ChiefMackDaddy]

8 hours ago, BenMerritt said:

The good news is that you may not have to start entirely from scratch. Chief Architect periodically writes archival copies of the plan file as it's being worked on. You may be able to acceaccess and restoress and restore one of those archive files.

 Any tips on where to find the archival file or if it is a different file type?  There were no other file types I could find and when you look in versioning when you right click the current plan file, it states this software does not save previous versions as part of a backup protocol, again, not to harp, but we started doing that as part of software in the early 2000's.  I will start saving daily by date since this does not occur in the software but am very curious on the archival to see if any of my plans have been archived.  That may be a solution.  Luckily I saved it as a different file name on June 13th so I only lost about 10 days of work, but in future I'll just have a new file name daily to ensure each day has a backup.  And yes I do backup to the cloud but it's the same file so same issue, versioning is about the only approach to fix this design flaw without renaming a new file name as your back up each day you use the software.

[DBCooper]

I would strongly encourage you to spend more time reading and watching videos if you want to learn how to use Chief more efficiently.  

 

By default, Chief will save daily archives. You can have it save them more often by changing a setting in your preferences.

 

This tech article will tell you how to find them:

https://www.chiefarchitect.com/support/article/KB-00099/accessing-your-archive-files.html

 

[stevenyhof]

Losing a file is extremely frustrating, but Chief has this area covered very well once you know what you want to set up. Also look into something like IDrive. It backs up with versioning in real time. 

 

Then if I were you, I would delete this post. 

 

Also, search around, there are a number of users that provide training. I would strongly recommend training to save yourself months of frustration.

[BenMerritt]

On 6/22/2024 at 6:07 PM, ChiefMackDaddy said:

 Any tips on where to find the archival file or if it is a different file type?

As noted in the linked knowledge base article (the link to which got mangled in my original post; sorry about that), archives are kept in C:\Users\[YOUR USERNAME]\Documents\[NAME OF YOUR PRODUCT]\Archives on Windows machines. The path may vary slightly, e.g. if you've moved your Documents folder to another drive, but the path noted in the article is by far the most common. Underneath that, the archives are organized into folders which contain normal plan and layout files.

On 6/22/2024 at 6:07 PM, ChiefMackDaddy said:

When you look in versioning when you right click the current plan file, it states this software does not save previous versions as part of a backup protocol.

Are you referring to the Previous Versions tab of the Windows File Properties dialog? In my experience, I've seen relatively few programs actually integrate with the Windows File History functionality, which I imagine is for several reasons:

1. The File History feature is only an incomplete backup solution; it does very little to protect against hard drive failures.
2. The interface to access it is fairly well buried in menus unless you know what you're looking for.
3. It only works on Windows, meaning that, for cross-platform software, another solution is necessary anyway.

This limitation is reason that we implemented the archive system, which, as noted above, does keep daily revisions of the plan file in a way that works on all our supported operating systems.