disappearing annotations?

sovre · 06-10-2011, 05:30 AM

As I was looking over the ebooks on my reader, I noticed something odd: many of the books suddenly said "new" next to them, although they were books I had read before or have been reading. Then I went to take a look at the annotations for two books I had recently read (both in pdf format): although my reader had kept the place of my last read page, all of my notes and highlighting had disappeared. One of these books I had made extensive annotations in which I need, but they now appear to be lost. I even went into the annotations folder to check the file itself--just an empty 1k file. Other books I have read long before still have their annotations preserved, so I do not understand what happened. All I can figure out is those books are in epub format, whereas the books I lost my notes for were in pdf format. Would that make a difference? I am a bit nervous to take notes while reading a book now, for fear I will lose all of my work. Has this happened to anyone else before and does anyone know what might have caused it?

Actually, I just noticed none of my annotations and highlights are showing up on the "notes" list in my reader, or are available for export in the Reader Library now. But the books I've had on there for a longer time still do seem to have annotation files with information, which I can see by going to the file folder--but for some reason my reader isn't seeing those files, and I cannot access any notes or see any highlighted passages, either on my reader or in the Reader Library--so it's as if everything is as good as lost. I have also lost access to all word logs.

sovre · 06-10-2011, 04:54 PM

I'm, guessing, from the lack of replies, that not too many people have had this happen to them.

I did find a thread in this forum by someone who had a similar experience:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=120302

Unfortunately, it seems the cause was never determined and there isn't any information in the thread I can make use of to fix the problem. Though from now on I am going to be sure to back up my reader folder.

The odd thing is, the poster describes having had this experience before the problem arose:

"Before this happened yesterday I was reading an e-book on my Reader (a book that was originally in eReader PDB format), and I noticed that when I got to chapter 3 the font was suddenly smaller. I looked at every other chapter in the book and verified that only chapter 3 had the smaller font. I thought this was strange. Then later in the day I noticed that the font size for chapter 3 had returned to normal. After that I went to my list of notes and realized that all of my annotations for chapters 1 and 2 had disappeared, and I only had my notes starting from the beginning of chapter 3, the spot I had noticed the mysterious and temporary change in font size."

I had the very same experience before I lost all of my notes. I was reading a book in which the font size mysteriously became smaller for one chapter. I can only conclude there is some kind of rare bug in the software somewhere that causes this.

Right now I am mainly concerned with trying to find some way to access the annotation files which did not get erased. (I came to realize I lost the ones I did because I opened those books in my reader and went to look for my notes--as soon as I did that, the Reader overwrote my old annotation file.) The rest of my annotation files are visible in their folders, when accessed from my computer. But the Sony Reader cannot seem to see or access them. I tried backing one up, and then creating a new notes file for the book, and then copying the information from the old annotation file into the new one, but this doesn't work. The Reader refuses to see any of my old annotation information and will not let me do anything but create an entirely new, and empty, annotation file.

Does anyone know what is preventing my Sony Reader from seeing the information in the annotation files which I can see are physically there on the disk? It seems like unless I can get it to see them, all of my annotations are lost. I have tried looking through the files for information, but there is nothing there I can understand. I can't find anything listed there like page numbers, which would allow me to at least refind and rehighlight the same passages.

06-10-2011, 05:30 AM	#1
sovre Zealot Posts: 108 Karma: 10 Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: United States Device: iPad Mini; iPhone; Kindle Paperwhite (10th gen)	disappearing annotations? As I was looking over the ebooks on my reader, I noticed something odd: many of the books suddenly said "new" next to them, although they were books I had read before or have been reading. Then I went to take a look at the annotations for two books I had recently read (both in pdf format): although my reader had kept the place of my last read page, all of my notes and highlighting had disappeared. One of these books I had made extensive annotations in which I need, but they now appear to be lost. I even went into the annotations folder to check the file itself--just an empty 1k file. Other books I have read long before still have their annotations preserved, so I do not understand what happened. All I can figure out is those books are in epub format, whereas the books I lost my notes for were in pdf format. Would that make a difference? I am a bit nervous to take notes while reading a book now, for fear I will lose all of my work. Has this happened to anyone else before and does anyone know what might have caused it? Actually, I just noticed none of my annotations and highlights are showing up on the "notes" list in my reader, or are available for export in the Reader Library now. But the books I've had on there for a longer time still do seem to have annotation files with information, which I can see by going to the file folder--but for some reason my reader isn't seeing those files, and I cannot access any notes or see any highlighted passages, either on my reader or in the Reader Library--so it's as if everything is as good as lost. I have also lost access to all word logs. Last edited by sovre; 06-10-2011 at 06:01 AM.

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06-10-2011, 04:54 PM	#2
sovre Zealot Posts: 108 Karma: 10 Join Date: Dec 2010 Location: United States Device: iPad Mini; iPhone; Kindle Paperwhite (10th gen)	I'm, guessing, from the lack of replies, that not too many people have had this happen to them. I did find a thread in this forum by someone who had a similar experience: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=120302 Unfortunately, it seems the cause was never determined and there isn't any information in the thread I can make use of to fix the problem. Though from now on I am going to be sure to back up my reader folder. The odd thing is, the poster describes having had this experience before the problem arose: "Before this happened yesterday I was reading an e-book on my Reader (a book that was originally in eReader PDB format), and I noticed that when I got to chapter 3 the font was suddenly smaller. I looked at every other chapter in the book and verified that only chapter 3 had the smaller font. I thought this was strange. Then later in the day I noticed that the font size for chapter 3 had returned to normal. After that I went to my list of notes and realized that all of my annotations for chapters 1 and 2 had disappeared, and I only had my notes starting from the beginning of chapter 3, the spot I had noticed the mysterious and temporary change in font size." I had the very same experience before I lost all of my notes. I was reading a book in which the font size mysteriously became smaller for one chapter. I can only conclude there is some kind of rare bug in the software somewhere that causes this. Right now I am mainly concerned with trying to find some way to access the annotation files which did not get erased. (I came to realize I lost the ones I did because I opened those books in my reader and went to look for my notes--as soon as I did that, the Reader overwrote my old annotation file.) The rest of my annotation files are visible in their folders, when accessed from my computer. But the Sony Reader cannot seem to see or access them. I tried backing one up, and then creating a new notes file for the book, and then copying the information from the old annotation file into the new one, but this doesn't work. The Reader refuses to see any of my old annotation information and will not let me do anything but create an entirely new, and empty, annotation file. Does anyone know what is preventing my Sony Reader from seeing the information in the annotation files which I can see are physically there on the disk? It seems like unless I can get it to see them, all of my annotations are lost. I have tried looking through the files for information, but there is nothing there I can understand. I can't find anything listed there like page numbers, which would allow me to at least refind and rehighlight the same passages.

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