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Help! Can't retrieve document Thread poster: Armorel Young
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I've just spent hours working on a particularly tedious Word document which I completed, saved and closed. Immediately I'd closed it I realised I hadn't saved it on My Documents as I usually do but had simply clicked on the save icon, so it had saved itself wherever it was when I initially opened it as an e-mail attachment. Now I can neither find it nor retrieve it. It is showing in the recently used files list, but if I click on it I get "cannot open document". It appears to be in folder NQZXX5... See more I've just spent hours working on a particularly tedious Word document which I completed, saved and closed. Immediately I'd closed it I realised I hadn't saved it on My Documents as I usually do but had simply clicked on the save icon, so it had saved itself wherever it was when I initially opened it as an e-mail attachment. Now I can neither find it nor retrieve it. It is showing in the recently used files list, but if I click on it I get "cannot open document". It appears to be in folder NQZXX537 but I can't navigate to that folder (which seems to be inside Content IE5 inside Temporary Internet Files, and yet if I go to Temporary Internet Files nothing with the right name is showing). Searching for the file name or for NQZXX537 in the Windows search function (I'm using XP) doesn't find it. I'm in despair at the thought of having to redo the whole job. Surely it must be there somewhere ?!! ▲ Collapse
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RHELLER
United States
Local time: 06:03
French to English
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use the Windows search function (start-search)
you can specify word document, when you worked on it last (this week) and keywords
HTH
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| Search doesn't work | Jan 19, 2006 |
Rita, thanks for your suggestion but the Windows search function simply doesn't find it, whether I search by file name, date or the mysterious folder name.
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Woodstock (X) 
Germany
Local time: 14:03
German to English
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| You've probably already tried this: | Jan 19, 2006 |
But just in case... When in a panic, the obvious is not always foremost.
Open Word, open the first item in the menu bar (I don't know what it is in English, as I have the German version, where it's called "Datei"), then at the bottom is a list of the most recent files you've worked on. That should do it.
If that doesn't work, can you open it via your e-mail program? You said it was an attachment, so maybe you can open the original e-mail, then the attachment, and that s... See more But just in case... When in a panic, the obvious is not always foremost.
Open Word, open the first item in the menu bar (I don't know what it is in English, as I have the German version, where it's called "Datei"), then at the bottom is a list of the most recent files you've worked on. That should do it.
If that doesn't work, can you open it via your e-mail program? You said it was an attachment, so maybe you can open the original e-mail, then the attachment, and that should be it since you saved it to the same place. But I have no idea how those files work. Or at least check the path on the original attachment and track down your file that way.
Good luck.
Added later:
Sorry, I saw that you had already looked at the MRU list, but assumed you meant the one in the Start menu on the desktop. Now I'm not sure, so if you also looked at the one in Word, then the other suggestions are obviously better.
[Edited at 2006-01-19 22:04] ▲ Collapse
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| strange thing | Jan 19, 2006 |
Hi, i did something similar just in an attempt to locate the temp. folder. To my surprise, the Windows Explorer does not see any folders in the Temporary Internet Files folder, and it should!
I use another programme, PowerDesk. It has much more features, but first of all it shows the temporary internet files folder as something completely different. This time there are several folders inside, one of which is the one, where my attachment was saved. Try this programme and see if you c... See more Hi, i did something similar just in an attempt to locate the temp. folder. To my surprise, the Windows Explorer does not see any folders in the Temporary Internet Files folder, and it should!
I use another programme, PowerDesk. It has much more features, but first of all it shows the temporary internet files folder as something completely different. This time there are several folders inside, one of which is the one, where my attachment was saved. Try this programme and see if you can navigate to this folder.
Piotr ▲ Collapse
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| hidden/system files? | Jan 19, 2006 |
Just a wild guess but did you tell Windows to search hidden/system files too? If it saved under some default IE progam location, it might be somewhere in your Program files, which I believe Windows hides by default (I assume so one doesn't accidentally delete important programs).(I don't use IE so am not really sure about this).
So either un-hide system folders:
* Click Start.
* Open My Computer.
* Select the Tools menu and click Folder Options.
... See more Just a wild guess but did you tell Windows to search hidden/system files too? If it saved under some default IE progam location, it might be somewhere in your Program files, which I believe Windows hides by default (I assume so one doesn't accidentally delete important programs).(I don't use IE so am not really sure about this).
So either un-hide system folders:
* Click Start.
* Open My Computer.
* Select the Tools menu and click Folder Options.
* Select the View Tab.
* Under the Hidden files and folders heading select Show hidden files and folders.
* Uncheck the Hide protected operating system files (recommended) option.
* Click Yes to confirm.
* Click OK.
and then try to navigate to that same folder again (temporary internet files?)and see if you can now find folder NQZXX537.
Or, when you do a search, be sure to scroll down to "advanced search options" and click "search hidden files and folders".
I had a similar problem once and this is how I solved it. Good luck! ▲ Collapse
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Jerzy Czopik
Germany
Local time: 14:03
Member (2003)
Polish to German
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| Try to tell Windows it shall show you ALL files, not only what it wants | Jan 19, 2006 |
Per default on any M$ machine some files are "hidden", ie they are not shown, although they are not really hidden files. These are system files in the first line, but also templates.
The content of the Internet temp folder is considered by Windows to be a system folder, so usually it does not show.
To show all files, go to Start, Control Panel, Folder settings (or similar, sorry - I come from german Windows) and then cklic on the Vie tab. Then make sure, that "Hide protected files (r... See more Per default on any M$ machine some files are "hidden", ie they are not shown, although they are not really hidden files. These are system files in the first line, but also templates.
The content of the Internet temp folder is considered by Windows to be a system folder, so usually it does not show.
To show all files, go to Start, Control Panel, Folder settings (or similar, sorry - I come from german Windows) and then cklic on the Vie tab. Then make sure, that "Hide protected files (recommended)" is UNCHECKED and "Show all files and folders" is CHECKED.
Then use perhaps a better file manager as Windows Explorer, for instance the PowerDesk one, mentioned by Piotr. You can buy a licence here or contact me - some computer magazines have a lite version with their editions, which is free, so I could make it available to you.
Then try the trick with Word, as described above, as it usualy keeps the record of the last opened file.
But, if you used a translation memory, so nothing is lost - simply retranslate the original file using your TM.
And last but not least a tip: never do save your documents in "My documents" folder, which is located on c:\document and settings\... Doing so bears a very big danger to your files, as any slightest damage to your operating system - which is not so very unlikely nowadays - will leave you without any single user document. Therfore allways use at least TWO partitions on your HDD (or two HDDs or any other suitable option to separate OS and programs from document). C:\ for OS and programs and D:\ for documents. So then if something happens to your OS, your data will be kept safely in a different location.
Good luck
Jerzy
[Edited at 2006-01-19 22:07] ▲ Collapse
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| Thanks but still trying | Jan 19, 2006 |
Thanks for all the ideas, folks - so far nothing has yet worked so do keep the suggestions coming! The situation so far is that I have a supposed file path (Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\ContentIE5\NQZXX537) but it isn't actually navigable - I get to Temporary Internet Files and the trail goes cold (even with displaying hidden files). I still have the original e-mail attachment but that is the unamended version, not the one I have painstakingly worked on.
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TonyTK
German to English
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| I'm the last person who should be .. | Jan 19, 2006 |
... giving advice on this kind of thing, but have you searched for a word or phrase that you can recall from the text and that is not so common as to feature in hundreds of other files?
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| Powerdesk has a "freeware" version | Jan 19, 2006 |
When you download Powerdesk trial version, it is fully functional and only it will remind you from time to time that you can upgrade it to PD6 Pro. Just give it a try. I really was surprised to see completely different contents of temporary internet file folder in the system browser and Powerdesk
PIotr
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Jerzy Czopik
Germany
Local time: 14:03
Member (2003)
Polish to German
+ ...
| Then try this | Jan 19, 2006 |
Go to (with hidden files showing) C:\document and settings\current user\local settings\temp - which is the temp folder of your operating system for the current logged in user (where user name shall be replaced by your own user name) and look at the *.tmp files located there. Try to open bigger of them (> 20 kB). Maybe one of them could be a shadow of your file. However, this will work only when you didn´t close Word in the meantime. The chances a... See more Go to (with hidden files showing) C:\document and settings\current user\local settings\temp - which is the temp folder of your operating system for the current logged in user (where user name shall be replaced by your own user name) and look at the *.tmp files located there. Try to open bigger of them (> 20 kB). Maybe one of them could be a shadow of your file. However, this will work only when you didn´t close Word in the meantime. The chances are not big, but nevertheless it is worth trying.
Good luck
Jerzy ▲ Collapse
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| You cannot overwrite an attachment | Jan 19, 2006 |
Another thing that I have noticed is that you cannot overwrite your attachment in the temp. folder, because such a file has a "read only" attribute. So you must have saved it with a different name. Then, even if you close Word, the file should not disappear.
Piotr
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Oliver Walter
United Kingdom
Local time: 13:03
German to English
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| There may be hope or it may not exist | Jan 19, 2006 |
Armorel Young wrote:
Thanks for all the ideas, folks - so far nothing has yet worked so do keep the suggestions coming! The situation so far is that I have a supposed file path (Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\ContentIE5\NQZXX537) but it isn't actually navigable
1. I think that when you open a document by clicking on the attachment icon in your email program, the operating system copies the attachment into an actual file in a temporary directory (i.e. a directory for temporary files) and then asks Word (if it's a Word doc) to open it. You then edit it and ask Word to save it. Word obediently saves it back to the place that it came from (as you didn't use "Save As...". Then when Word exits or you close the email you were looking at or the email program exits (I don't know which of these it is), the file is deleted as it was a temporary one.
2. If that is the case, the only hope of retrieving it is probably to use software (which is available for download from the Internet, though I don't have such a program myself) which can "undelete" deleted files, and that won't be possible if what you have done since then has created further files (temporary or not) that have re-used the disk space that was occupied by this one prior to its deletion.
Example: Probably OK, though I haven't used it:
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/restoration.html
3. There is another hope, but only if you have configured Word to make a backup copy of an edited file: In Word2000 this is Options - Tools - Save, and tick "Always create backup copy". This, AND you did a Save before the final one at which you exited. (Always do frequent Saves with Word, to rescu the situation if it crashes - you can go back to the last edit stage that you saved.)
If you did this, there should be a file called xxx.bak in the same folder that contained xxx.doc before it was deleted, and this one might not have been deleted, because it doesn't have the original full file name.
4. Another thought _ I'm not at all sure about this: See whether the deleted file was saved in the "recycle" bin: deleted files normally go there (instead of being really deleted) unless you have taken action to ensure that they don't. The recycle bin is, by default, 10% of the disk size and when it's full, I think the oldest files are really deleted. You probably haven't deleted files totalling 10% of the disk's size since your problem.
5. I hope that might help or perhaps, regrettably, make you decide the quest will not be successful and then you've learned something.
Oliver
[Edited at 2006-01-19 22:37]
[Edited at 2006-01-19 22:43]
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| Windows Explorer does not show these files | Jan 19, 2006 |
(I don't know why) even if you unhide the hidden files - I mean Temporary Internet Files. I usually look them up using Total Commander - or you can use the Power Desk as suggested above, and some other options too, I believe.
Antonin
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