Just lost a whole day's work with a Sigil crash

[Gregg Bell]

I've been formatting a novel all day. Saving regularly. Then I entered some code into a blank html page in Code View, forgetting to have the xml Doctype stuff up top. I got a message in the preview that something was wrong. I tried to X out but the screen was frozen. Then Sigil crashed. A window came up and I chose "Relaunch." But I got a window that said my file couldn't be found.

So I waited and started Sigil on its own and opened the file, but none of the work I'd done all day was there. I thought I'd opened the wrong file but it was the right one.

As freakiness would have it this was the one time I was saving the file in only one place. <shaking head>

I just tested the selfsame file to see if it is saving changes and it is.

Anybody know what might've happened? How this was even possible? (I must have saved it fifty times.)

[Pablo]

I think it would be a good idea to open a copy of a working ePub file and repeat the sequence (add blank html file, enter code without the Doctype stuff) and see if the same happens again. In that case you could share the details so that someone else tries to recreate the problem.

That's the best way to find a solution.

[DiapDealer]

When you add a blank html file, the xml declaration is automatically created. Unless you explicitly delete it, there's no reason for a new, blank html file NOT to have an xml declaration.

If you have Mend on Save and Open enabled in your preferences, there's no way that I know of to lose "everything." There's really no good reason to disable Mend. It will easily/painlessly fix things like missing xml declarations. It can literally save you from yourself. Disable it at your own peril.

If Mend was enabled, then I've no idea how "everything" could be gone. Even with a crash. It doesn't make sense. Deleting the xml declaration (and continuing to edit) doesn't cause a crash on my system. It just tells me I have xhtml that's not well-formed and gives me the option to fix it automatically, or fix it manually.

[KevinH]

If you really did a full save numerous times, have you searched your filesystem for that epub updated more recently than the one you found. Sigil crashing can not impact a previously saved file no matter how it tries unless the crash happens when saving to the only copy of the file, which is not what you described.

You could try sorting your files by modification date to see if you overwrote some other file by accident.

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by Pablo

I think it would be a good idea to open a copy of a working ePub file and repeat the sequence (add blank html file, enter code without the Doctype stuff) and see if the same happens again. In that case you could share the details so that someone else tries to recreate the problem.

That's the best way to find a solution.

Okay. Just repeated the process and this time Sigil didn't crash. I opened a new blank file. I deleted what was there. I pasted my stuff (see screenshot). I got the warning but was able to continue with full functionality.

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

When you add a blank html file, the xml declaration is automatically created. Unless you explicitly delete it, there's no reason for a new, blank html file NOT to have an xml declaration.

If you have Mend on Save and Open enabled in your preferences, there's no way that I know of to lose "everything." There's really no good reason to disable Mend. It will easily/painlessly fix things like missing xml declarations. It can literally save you from yourself. Disable it at your own peril.

If Mend was enabled, then I've no idea how "everything" could be gone. Even with a crash. It doesn't make sense. Deleting the xml declaration (and continuing to edit) doesn't cause a crash on my system. It just tells me I have xhtml that's not well-formed and gives me the option to fix it automatically, or fix it manually.

Hey Diap. Yeah, I explained myself poorly. I did delete all the xml doctype stuff when I opened the blank file. I do it all the time when I copy and paste from a previous book (which brings along all the xml stuff at the top). Only this time I was just pasting something from the code without the full page. (screenshot)

So that was the exact screen I got. I tried to X out of the window. I clicked on a few more things to test the funtionality but the screen was froze. I would say about twenty seconds later Sigil crashed and I got the window asking me if I wanted to re-launch Sigil, which I chose. Then I got the window saying that specific file I'd been working on couldln't be found.

So I looked for the file. I had two copies of it but only one that I had done the great majority of work on. I opened it and it was missing the great majority of the work. Like I said, I thought I'd missed something and checked the other file. Same thing. Missing the majority of the work. I did a file search to see if there happened to be more than two copies. There wasn't.

It seemed absolutely impossible that that could have happened but that's what happened.

And yeah Mend is on Open and Save. (screenshot)

I kept working with the same file and it saved properly. (I of course also saved it somewhere else.)

[Gregg Bell]

Originally Posted by KevinH

If you really did a full save numerous times, have you searched your filesystem for that epub updated more recently than the one you found. Sigil crashing can not impact a previously saved file no matter how it tries unless the crash happens when saving to the only copy of the file, which is not what you described.

You could try sorting your files by modification date to see if you overwrote some other file by accident.

Hi Kevin. I guess I was upset when I made that first post because it didn't come across too effectively. I have two copies of the file but was only working on one. For three or four hours I worked on it making maybe fifty full saves. Then I opened a blank file, deleted what was there and posted my stuff (screenshot).

That's when the Preview error screen came up. I clicked on it to close it but it wouldn't close. I clicked some other things but the whole screen was froze and about twenty seconds later Sigil crashed. Then I got the window asking me if I wanted to relaunch, which I chose. But then I got another window saying the file I'd been working on couldn't be found. (And that's actually kind of a mystery right there.)

And I checked the only other copy of the file and, as expected, the great majority of it was missing.

Sigil crashing can not impact a previously saved file no matter how it tries unless the crash happens when saving to the only copy of the file,

I was not saving at the time but this must be what happened somehow. At least that's my guess.

After that, I kept working on Sigil with the same file until just now and everything worked perfectly. I of course saved to the copy this time as well.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

Hey Diap. Yeah, I explained myself poorly. I did delete all the xml doctype stuff when I opened the blank file. I do it all the time when I copy and paste from a previous book (which brings along all the xml stuff at the top). Only this time I was just pasting something from the code without the full page. (screenshot)

Gregg, why in all the hells would you do that? Why would you be deleting the REQUIRED "xml stuff"? I realize that you say that the copy-paste is bringing along the Doctype declaration, etc., but, WHY delete what's there? Why aren't you pasting over it, if indeed the copied material has the requisite "stuff"? Honestly, you are ASKING for errors like that.

So I looked for the file. I had two copies of it but only one that I had done the great majority of work on. I opened it and it was missing the great majority of the work. Like I said, I thought I'd missed something and checked the other file. Same thing. Missing the majority of the work. I did a file search to see if there happened to be more than two copies. There wasn't.

It seemed absolutely impossible that that could have happened but that's what happened.

And yeah Mend is on Open and Save. (screenshot)

I kept working with the same file and it saved properly. (I of course also saved it somewhere else.)

You know, I've been "in" computers since 1975. Oh, not like some of the guys here; I'm no steely-eyed programmer. But I started with 80-column punch cards, in '75, and I've been involved with them in one form or another since that time. Everything from developing early word processing applications, to installing Basic4 mini-computer networks in hotels, to what I do now, and in all that time, Gregg--in 42 years--I've never, never seen anything go back and eat a saved file. Never. Not this side of a disk crash, of course.

Yes, I agree with you, it seems impossible.

Also: I don't understand what it is you are copy-pasting. If it's your book, don't you just export it to HTML, and then open that HTML in Sigil?

Don't delete the head material. Just...paste over it, IF you truly have the same material in the copied stuff.

I gotta say, I think there's a perfectly good ePUB, someplace, on your computer. What you say does sound completely impossible.

Hitch

[JSWolf]

I have to agree. Unless the crash happened that affected the ePub, the ePub would most likely be corrupt.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Gregg Bell

I've been formatting a novel all day. Saving regularly. Then I entered some code into a blank html page in Code View, forgetting to have the xml Doctype stuff up top. I got a message in the preview that something was wrong. I tried to X out but the screen was frozen. Then Sigil crashed. A window came up and I chose "Relaunch." But I got a window that said my file couldn't be found.

You might be able to recover some files from the Sigil temp folders.

To locate the Sigil temp folders do the following:

1. Close all Sigil instances.
2. a) Windows: Select C:\Windows\Temp in the Windows Explorer.
2. b) Linux: Select /tmp in your file manager.
3. Sort the folders alphabetically and look for folders that start with Sigil, e.g. Sigil-ABC123.
4. Double-click the folder. If it contains an OEBPS folder, double-click it, open content.opf in a text editor and look for the title metadata entry:

<dc:title>My Book Title</dc:title>

4. If it's your book, check the folder date/time and check the HTML files in the OEBPS/Text folder. If they contain the lost text, copy the whole folder to the desktop and add the HTML files to a new book.

Do not modify Sigil temp files while Sigil is running!

[BetterRed]

@Gregg Bell - FWIW I use Save As, with current timestamp prepended to the file name.

BR

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by BetterRed

FWIW I use Save As, with current timestamp prepended to the file name.

Some time ago a wrote a very simple output plugin that does this automatically. I could PM it to you or post it in the plugin thread if there's enough interest by other Sigil users.

[PandathePanda]

Originally Posted by Doitsu

Some time ago a wrote a very simple output plugin that does this automatically. I could PM it to you or post it in the plugin thread if there's enough interest by other Sigil users.

I think there might be a need for something like this

[KevinH]

I still have issues with this ...

1. Sigil will not erase a previously saved file that is saved anyplace outside of its own temp folder.

2. Sigil might corrupt a file being saved to if a crash happens while in the act of saving but even that is rare as it prebuilds the new epub in its temp space and then copies the already built epub file to the location to be saved. So a good copy of the epub should either exist in temp or outside of Sigil temp area.



So an epub file stored outside Sigil's temp folder should never be erased as described in this post. It sounds more likely it was being saved to inside Sigil's temp folder (a really bad idea!), bad anti-malware software, or disk corruption unrelated to Sigil.

Did you try Doitsu's instructions for looking inside your systems temp folder to see if you can find a more up-to-date version of the epub or epub files?

[JSWolf]

What I don't get is why the ePub is not up to at least the second-to-last save. Could this be a Linux issue?