Auto Recovery didn't work

[dionemk]

I had walked away from a design I was working on and hadn't saved recently. Apparently the app or my computer crashed because when I came back later, it was closed. When I opened designer, it opened as usual and didn't prompt me to recover files or anything. When I opened the file, it was from the version previously saved a long ways back. When designer has crashed in the past, I've found that it will prompt me to recover files only if they are unsaved. If they've been saved at any point, designer doesn't prompt me to recover and simply reverts back to the last previous save. I've tried searching the forums for a temporary file location but I cannot find one on my computer. In my preferences, my file recovery interval is set to the default 300 seconds, so that shouldn't be an issue. Also, it's frustrating to me that my files are apparently safer being an unsaved file than in an actual saved file if the program or computer crashes. Any insights? Because I'm tempted to copy my designs over to an unsaved document anytime I work in order to protect them but there's got to be a better way. Oh, and I'm using Windows 10. Thanks.

[Dan C]

Hi @dionemk,

Welcome to the forums

I'm very sorry to hear this has happened, I'm certainly unsure of the cause from your description so I'd like to investigate this further for you.

Firstly, please open Windows Run (Windows Key + R) then paste the following string and press OK:

%appdata%\Affinity\Designer\1.0\autosave

In the window that opens, you should find any Autosave files that Designer has kept. If you move these files from this location, then change the file format to .afdesign, the files should open directly in Designer. Any are of these files the 'missing' file?

Secondly, please re-open Windows Run and this time use the below string:

%appdata%\Affinity\Designer\1.0\CrashReports\reports

In the window that opens, you should find any available crash reports from the app - if there is one from the day of this incident, could you upload this here for me?

Many thanks in advance!

[walt.farrell]

15 hours ago, dionemk said:

When designer has crashed in the past, I've found that it will prompt me to recover files only if they are unsaved. If they've been saved at any point, designer doesn't prompt me to recover and simply reverts back to the last previous save.

Both should be recovered, but the Affinity applications work differently for files that were new (unnamed) at the time of the crash and files that had been saved previously (and thus have a name).

• When you restart the application, you should get a prompt to recover any of the unnamed files you were working on that have recovery files.
• Later, if you Open a named file that has a recovery file, you should get the prompt to recover it at that time. (You would also have to use the same application you were previously using, of course.)

All of this works for me. I'm not sure why it might have failed to work for you.