It's happened again - lost work

whatthedickens
Hours' worth of work this time - highlights and stickies. After closing the tab with my file snapshot and returning to the snapshot, it was all gone. Work that I'd done in an earlier editing session was still there, but some of the stickies had moved location.

I thought I'd backed up my work by making a copy of User > Library Application Support > Firefox > Profiles > f3wqluxc.default > zotero part way through the day. But when I tried replacing the current folder with that copy in an effort to restore my work, I didn't get what I was looking for.

This happened to me last week. (See discussion: Erratic Saving.) Going back to an earlier version got Zotero functioning for me again, and I appreciate the help. But it is frustrating to have no dependable way to save my work.

I planned a whole class for tomorrow around the work I did today. All gone.
  • dstillman
    What version was this in?
  • whatthedickens
    1.07.r3334
  • dstillman
    Do you have any other extensions installed? In the latest dev builds, Zotero runs the annotation and highlight saving code on the standard "beforeunload" and "close" events that Firefox provides. It's possible that something is preventing those events from being called. We're not able to reproduce any problems with this, however.

    Note that annotations and highlights are currently saved differently from all the other data in Zotero. When you edit data in the metadata pane, the data is saved immediately. When you edit a note, changes are saved on a timer a couple seconds after you stop typing. We're planning to change annotations and highlights to save on a timer as well, but we haven't implemented that yet.
  • whatthedickens
    I don't believe I'm running any other extensions. At Preferences > Add-ons > Manage Add-ons, the only extension listed is Zotero.

    I hope that autosave for highlights and annotations is implemented soon! These are great features, but only if you can feel confident that hours of edits won't mysteriously disappear.

    Meanwhile, isn't there anything I can do to back these up?

    And do you have any best-practice recommendations around closing annotated files? Should I stay away from tabs? Periodically quit and restart Firefox?
  • dstillman
    Since the annotations and highlights currently aren't saved until you leave the page, backing up the file midway through won't do any good. However, you don't need to close the tab or window to trigger a save—you just need to navigate away from the page. I'd recommend simply clicking the Home button or a bookmark button after you've made a bunch of changes, which should trigger a save, and then either clicking Back or re-opening the attachment from Zotero. As long as your annotations and highlights appear at that point, they should be safely stored in the database.

    When you were closing the tab, were you using Cmd-W, using the menu option, or clicking on the tab's close icon? I've seen intermittent cases where Firefox 3 quits immediately on Cmd-Q without properly shutting itself down, and this may be a similar bug.
  • whatthedickens
    I use all these methods at various times, so I don't remember which one I used just before losing my work. However, I would remember if Firefox just quit on Cmd-Q without asking me if I want to just quit or save-and-quit; that didn't happen.

    I usually have something like 2-8 tabs open at once. When I have a snapshot open in one of those tabs, and I want to go to a website, I sometimes navigate away from the snapshot within that tab, sometimes open a new tab, and sometimes select an already open tab and use that.

    Sounds like I should make a practice of periodically navigating away from the snapshot to go to another website. As I understand you, this will trigger a save.

    However, twice burned thrice shy. I will probably wait to use highlights and annotations till the autosave feature is in place. I had just found the perfect middle ground between open and collapsed stickies, creating notes a few sentences long that I could resize, keep open in the margin, and scroll through to re-read. I created a lot of them. There were some nice insights in them that I can no longer recall...
  • whatthedickens
    edited September 11, 2008
    Here is my experience today, repeated numerous times, in version 1.07.r3352.

    I open a snapshot. I type a sticky or highlight text. I navigate away from the snapshot by clicking on the "home" icon on my Firefox toolbar. I come back to my snapshot. The sticky or highlight is gone.

    I've filed an error report. ID is 1240673406.

    This sequence appears to be 100% reliable. The edits have disappeared every time I've tried it.

    Update: I have also tried the following experiments: (1) close the tab, and (2) navigate to a website other than my homepage. Same result.

    Update 2: OK, this is interesting. The behavior isn't repeated when I use a different snapshot. The one in which this behavior is occurring is the one from which I previously lost hours of work. So has the file been corrupted by whatever caused the original loss?
  • dstillman
    That's helpful, thanks.

    If you don't mind, could you upload your database to the DB Repair Tool and then send us the Upload ID at support@zot....org so that we can take a look at the annotations table? You can ignore the repair links the tool provides and continue using your current database.

    A ZIP of the files belonging to the snapshot that's failing would also be helpful. You can access the snapshot directory with Show File.
  • whatthedickens
    Okay. Database uploaded. ID and archive of failing shapshot files sent.
Sign In or Register to comment.