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About Suzanne S. Barnhill
Expertise
I've been using Word for Windows since version 2.0 (1992), and the more I learn
about it, the more I realize how little I know. But I may know a few things
that you don't, and I'll help if I can. I answer many questions every day in
Microsoft's peer support newsgroups and as a result have been awarded the
MVP (Most Valuable Professional) designation by Microsoft Corporation. You
may be able to find the answer to your question at the Word MVPs' FAQ site or at my own Word FAQ site, so please check those first! Please, no questions about VBA (macros), Registry editing, networks, or complex merges, as I have no experience with these aspects of Word, nor do I have any experience with Word for the Mac.
Experience
I have a master's degree in classics (Latin), which is surprisingly helpful, though I no longer teach. The things I am proudest of: Having raised two children to maturity, both Merit Scholars, both college graduates (one a philosophy major!), one Phi Beta Kappa (from Harvard!); having been made a Paul Harris Fellow by my Rotary club; having been designated a Microsoft MVP.
Education/Credentials
B.A. (Latin), Agnes Scott College, 1966; M.A. (Classics), Emory University, 1972.
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You are here: Experts > Computing/Technology > Microsoft Software > Microsoft Word > urgent and desperate! to recover my word 2007 file...
Microsoft Word - urgent and desperate! to recover my word 2007 file...
Expert: Suzanne S. Barnhill - 11/4/2009
Question
Hi! A few days ago I lost a word 2007 file, I had been working on that essay for three days, and now I'm desperate...
I said: 'download file' to a word attachment from my yahoo e-mail account, and when it asked me "do you want to open or save this file", instead of saying 'save', (I guess) I said 'open', and continued working on that opened version hours and hours.
The thing is that I was not aware of that I did not save the file to the computer, so while I was writing on the file, in order to not to lose the changes sometimes I used to make ctrl+s to save the changes, and it did not warn me (saying sth like I could not save the changes because the file was not stored on the computer, etc.) so I did not doubt that I was working on an unsaved file...
I finished writing my essay, and wanted to close the word document and it did not ask me "do you want to save the changes? etc" and after closing it I realized I lost it!
The other thing is that I'm working on a shared computer in my school and I cannot access to all the files because I'm not the administrator, so I cannot see directly all the temporary files. I have been searching with the search companion the files with extension *.TMP and ~*.* , and I found nothing useful.
Do you think there may be a way to recover my essay?!!!!!
I would be soo happy if this miracle occurs... if not, I have to write it again..
Looking forward to hear from you,
Muge Yildirim
Answer
Under the circumstances, I'm afraid the file is almost certainly irretrievable. This is a painful lesson that too many people learn. From something I read recently, I thought that Word 2007 handled this differently but perhaps that is only if the attachment is opened within Outlook 2007 or some other mail client that resides on the computer. Since you were using a shared computer, the likelihood of finding the temp file intact is even less, but you might see the article at http://www.gmayor.com/outlook_attachments.htm to see if it has any relevance at all. I rather think, though, that this would be a "miracle."
I know in future you'll be very careful to either choose "Save" rather than "Open" or at least to remember to use "Save As" the first time you save. I *think* that if you had chosen to email the file back to yourself, you might have received the edited version, but I'm not sure of this, especially in the context of a Web mail account versus a resident mail client.
Suzanne S. Barnhill
Microsoft MVP (Word) 1999-2009
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