Digital Workshop

I thought I had proteced myself from this one! I have just lost three hours work due to Opus 5.5 locking up on me when I attempted to run my publication. I have had this problem before so I save and reboot the programme. This time I had to use task manager to shut down Opus and I rebooted the PC.

When I restarted, my reloaded publication (autosaved version) appeared corrupted with the page names missing. So I loaded in the backup file. This was yesterdays! So I ended up with no backup for todays work. I do save the programme manually from time to time and I assumed that the backup file was saved with this action, not on a shut down.

Have I got all this wrong? Am I unique here? Running XP Prof.

This happens to me, but not very often. By co-incidence, it happened yesterday. Opus refused to run and I lost my last edits. I had to do a complete re-installation of Opus before I could get it running again. Fortunately I didn't loose very much work, but it is extremely frustrating. I save all the time and do incremental versions as well. The last time this happened was about 5 months ago, so for me, I just learn to live with it. When I re-installed, Opus found the autosaved versions of my programs, but the autosaved version of the active program was missing some edits.

Have you checked both the Backup and Autosave files for your projects?

Every time you click "Save" OPUS will also save a copy of your current project in Backup, and unless you've turned OFF the AutoSave feature, it automatically saves every 5 minute.

On ALL my projects I also do a ZIP file of the most current IMP project, AND I do a SAVE AS every couple of times. I do a SAVE every couple of OPUS transactions. OPUS also has a BACK UP (under Files) which also saves your resources as well as your IMP file in a ZIP file. I also backup to a separate HD, then to a third HD on really valueable projects, and every so often I burn a CD/DVD depending on the size of the project. The more time/value I've put into a project, the more I backup. With all my precautions -- I've not had the problems you have unfortunately experienced.

I strongly suggest you follow my lead. You can't have too many safety copies of your work. I've found the strongest supporters of backup copies, are people who have recently lost their hard work. Something obviously corrupted your computer files. Have you done a DEFRAG of your HD lately? Are your HDs nearly full? I do a DEFRAG at least once per week. I let it run overnight on my C: drive.

Again, I'm sorry to hear of your lose, and hope you will follow my ideas for future projects.

Fred

A routine like you suggest is essential. It might take a little extra time, but that pales into insignificance when you lose something that becomes irrecoverable.

About 6 years ago I lost a lot of valuable data when using Opus 2x. After that, I set up a procedure which is similar to yours. I also backup to external drives, and to CD/DVD. But, the most important process is backing up IMMEDIATELY AFTER I have completed a tricky piece of development.

Many years before that, I was asked by a client How often should I back up? My reply: What is your tolerance for rekeying? That sounds trite, but it holds very true for Opus, with the added concern of losing original creative ideas which you might never recover.

Jeremy,


To your question... 'yes', you have company.

Like you, I had some weirdness with the App or Pub getting lost, in my case probably in disk caching or when I was closing the pub. I only have 1 Gig of free disk space left, so I think my issue is with commit charge, virtual memory... and losing things in the swap files. Or, it could be Norton AV or Microsoft updates trying to do something.

The file I lost was 380K. The Autosave version I cannot recover is 1.5M. As Opus tries to open it... computer shows Opus taking 93% of CPU. After 30 minutes I gave up. Lost.

Fortunately, mine was a work in progress proving out different layouts and modest scripting. Can redo, but 'yes' a wasted chuck of time. My new disk has been sitting on the shelf... a low priority that just got hotter.

Guess I'll have to get more disciplined with Save-as versions every 15 minutes.