New hard drive - user states almost all data missing

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/27/2008 7:44 PM, and on a whim, Rainald Taesler
pounded out on the keyboard:

What do you mean by "specifically saved"??
Working with OneNote one does not "save" and close files (one note does
not even have a "Save" feature).

Okay, here we go. You state ON does not "save". But you have used
"stored", "created", and "saved" in describing how ON works. If one
doesn't "save", how do the notebook files (.one) come to be? How do
they have a specific name?

You stated ON doesn't save/store/create files in the locations I pointed
out, but I can assure you the user didn't find a path to the ON appdata
folder and decide to save/create/store (whatever it is ON does) in that
location.

But she states that most of
the time she would work in Onenote and then just close it and the
data would be there next time it was opened.

That's exactly the way one works with OneNote.
One just opens the notebooks (be it locally [standard location is
"%userprofile%\My Documents\OneNote Notebooks"] OR from a shared
(possibly mapped) device in the network.
One does not "close" the files (as is usual with standard applications),
one just leaves everything open and closes OneNote instead. When opening
OneNote again, everything is open.

So is this easily solved by figuring out what notebook the user had open
last? Will everything be in that notebook (that is not saved but either
stored or created some way)?

*NO*
Totally wrong assumption on your side.
What she told you just is the normal way of working with OneNote.

Okay, that's fine, I shouldn't have assumed. I saw specifically named
..one file and I thought the user saved them with that name. I'm even
more confused on how ON saves/stores/creates now.

*NO*
The OneNote notebook-file *normally* will not be stored locally if "My
Documents" is a network drive. They will - depending on how things are
set up - either sitting be in the User's "My Documents" directory OR -
to make things even more complicated - or on a *shared* network device
(if the notebooks are to used by other users too and in so far the
automatic synching feature is used).


OneNote works with a cache. That's the basics of it all.
By default (unless "symbolic links/NTFS-links are used) the cache is
sitting in the user's
%localappdata%\Microsoft\OneNote\12.0\
directory.
BUT: The cache is just one big file only usable by ON and there are no
usable notebooks in there.

I think MS needs to rethink its use of "cache". This is one example,
Offline Files is another. I'm not impressed on eithers reliability factor.

If - as you say - the "%userprofile%\My Documents" folder is sitting in
the network, there is no use at all in using the old local drive.
The notebooks have to opened from the place they were stored.

Rainald

Rainald, thank you so much for trying to assist me. I really appreciate
it. It's just the frustration level with so many MS ways of thinking
gets old. Saving data should be a no brainer, ESPECIALLY with a program
like ON. Users shouldn't have to look ANYWHERE but where their data is
stored (where you stated). But that's not the case here. The cache
sounds like a gray area, as someone said if the user may have been
working offline then changes wouldn't have synced. This process needs
to be more protective of user data/files/info.

You state nothing of use is in the ON appdata folder, but I clearly see
a Backup folder with .one files that may be the key to the users missing
data/files/info. We'll have to copy those over and see.

Any further communication let's try to limit it to threading off of this
post, unless clarification in other areas is needed.

Thanks again,

--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[Ilya Koulchin]

I'm seeing a lot of confusion and speculation in this thread, so perhaps
a short explanation of how OneNote works is in order.

When a user runs OneNote, it'll launch with a set of notebooks. These
notebooks can be individually closed, and new ones opened. Each notebook
is a folder in the filesystem, with .one files representing sections.
They default to being stored under "My Documents\OneNote Notebooks", but
can also be opened from any location. The location of each notebook is
visible by hovering the mouse over its icon in the left hand pane.

To allow for offline capabilities and multi-user editing, however,
OneNote doesn't work directly with the .one files. All changes are first
saved to the cache (the .onecache file you've found already), and then
synced out to the file. Similarly, all external changes to the file are
first synced into the cache, and then read from there.

If you suspect that the cache isn't in sync, the easiest solution is to
start up OneNote and let it sync. If all you have is the cachefile, you
can replace the cachefile on one of the other machines with OneNote and
let it sync (be careful with local notebooks though - if OneNote can't
find a notebook that's supposed to be stored on local disk it'll assume
it was deleted and close it).

OneNote also keeps backups of all changed sections. These are stored
under the Backups folder in the user's AppData folder. OneNote does not
ever read from these files - it'll only backup the changes into there
occasionally. If you want to restore the data from the backups, you'll
need to copy the backup files into one of the open notebooks (don't open
the backups folder as a notebook - it'll lead to uncontrolled section
duplication).

 

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/28/2008 12:40 PM, and on a whim, Ilya Koulchin
pounded out on the keyboard:

I'm seeing a lot of confusion and speculation in this thread, so perhaps
a short explanation of how OneNote works is in order.

When a user runs OneNote, it'll launch with a set of notebooks. These
notebooks can be individually closed, and new ones opened. Each notebook
is a folder in the filesystem, with .one files representing sections.
They default to being stored under "My Documents\OneNote Notebooks", but
can also be opened from any location. The location of each notebook is
visible by hovering the mouse over its icon in the left hand pane.

As I stated to Rainald, I was told (by him) that one doesn't "save"
files in ON. My question was how do they originate then? He used three
verbs to describe and "save" was one of them, along with "store" and
"create". This user has .one files in the default location, but they
are not a "folder in the filesystem", nor are there corresponding
folders. I would think if that was the case, there would be a folder
for every notebook and every folder would contain a .one file(s). But
most of the user files are individual files (.one) in the OneNote
Notebooks folder.

Finding the lost data/files/info may only be recovered by reinstalling
the old drive and noting the location of each notebook, so we can
pinpoint the location of the missing ones.

Since this particular user is still using Offline Files, I'm a little
hesitant to put in the old drive, not knowing what OF may do. I'm
thinking I should turn it off before installing the old drive, but the
old drive has it turned on, so I have no way to turn it off on the old
drive, unless I can turn off the wireless and not use a network cable to
force OF to not try and sync.

To allow for offline capabilities and multi-user editing, however,
OneNote doesn't work directly with the .one files. All changes are first
saved to the cache (the .onecache file you've found already), and then
synced out to the file. Similarly, all external changes to the file are
first synced into the cache, and then read from there.

I don't believe the user intentionally used ON in Offline mode (no
reason to really), but I can't verify that until I'm onsite tomorrow.

If you suspect that the cache isn't in sync, the easiest solution is to
start up OneNote and let it sync. If all you have is the cachefile, you
can replace the cachefile on one of the other machines with OneNote and
let it sync (be careful with local notebooks though - if OneNote can't
find a notebook that's supposed to be stored on local disk it'll assume
it was deleted and close it).

Originally, I was going to try that tomorrow. This makes me not want to
mess with replacing the cachefile with the old one on the old drive, as
I don't want to lose any more than she already has.

OneNote also keeps backups of all changed sections. These are stored
under the Backups folder in the user's AppData folder. OneNote does not
ever read from these files - it'll only backup the changes into there
occasionally. If you want to restore the data from the backups, you'll
need to copy the backup files into one of the open notebooks (don't open
the backups folder as a notebook - it'll lead to uncontrolled section
duplication).

I did find the Backup folder, with quite a few files in it, some that
are not even in the default folder (this puzzles me).

Why backups are ever stored in a program folder is beyond me. We
(admins) try to preserve data, and program writers put backups in an
application folder. Why isn't it backed up to the default? Unless a
computer user backs up the entire system, that (data in an app folder)
is useless if the hard drive dies.

So, to find out what is in the .one files in the Backup folder, would it
be best to create folders in the default location and place each .one
file into the corresponding folder and then open them from there?

Thank you for taking the time to explain,

--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/27/2008 1:41 PM, and on a whim, Terry R.
pounded out on the keyboard:

We have been replacing hard drives on laptops. I have a Onenote user
who told me today most of her Onenote files were missing. Since all
laptop data is stored on servers, I told her that any data should still
be in the folders it was in originally. Files that she specifically
saved are there. But she states that most of the time she would work in
Onenote and then just close it and the data would be there next time it
was opened.

I don't know how she is doing her work. I thought users saved Onenote
data like other programs, by saving files, but by her description I must
be wrong.

Is Onenote data stored locally even if My Documents is a network drive?
Would everything she works on be sitting in the cache?

I still have the old drive so I can retrieve anything left behind.

Thanks for any info here on how to get her info back.

Today I connected the old laptop drive to the laptop via USB. I moved
the .one files that were in the "Backup" folder but were NOT in the
default location. The files in that folder had the data the user had
been working on for months.

I still would like to know why the only copy was in the Backup folder in
the App Data and not in the default location. It wasn't the user, so it
had to be OneNote.

--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[Rainald Taesler]

Thanks for the follow-up. Really great news!
Congratulations.

Today I connected the old laptop drive to the laptop via USB. I
moved the .one files that were in the "Backup" folder but were NOT
in the default location. The files in that folder had the data the
user had been working on for months.

Only too natural if she did what's necessary: Backup data regularly. ;-)
How current the data are depends on how regular backups have been made,
however.

I still would like to know why the only copy was in the Backup
folder in the App Data and not in the default location. It wasn't
the user, so it had to be OneNote.

Sorry, IMHO wrong assumptions again.
Everyone working in IT-support knows that the most un-reliable source
for information in case of troubles are the *users*.
I'm sure that in the case given the user had done things which caused
the missing of the files in their default location. ON does not remove
the data files and/or move them without the user's command.

In order to avoid problems in the future, my advice would be to check
the settings for the storage of (a) date files (notebooks), (b) the
cache and (c) the backups and correct the paths in case the would be
wrong.
Go to "Tools | Options | Save".

I have been out of town for the last two days so that I could not reply
to your postings.
Ilya Koulchin has made a most valuable contribution to clear basic
things.
I'll check the whole thread in order to see if it might be useful to add
something in order to answer possibly open questions. Pls give me a day
or two.

Rainald

 

[Rainald Taesler]

I'm seeing a lot of confusion and speculation in this thread, so
perhaps a short explanation of how OneNote works is in order.

Thanks a million for your comprehensive description of ON storage
basics.
I saved it for future usage.

I'd be very sorry, should my replies in the multiple branches of the
thread would have added to the said confusion :-( :-(

Thanks again and regards
Rainald

 

[Rainald Taesler]

As said in my previous reply, I'll carefully go through the whole thread
in order to check if their might open questions.
Prior to that - as it seems *urgent* to me - just a short note:

Since this particular user is still using Offline Files, I'm a
little hesitant to put in the old drive, not knowing what OF may
do.

In general the One-notebook should *NOT* be part of the "Offline files"
mechanisms.
Synching with the "Offline files" features can seriously spoil things.

I'm thinking I should turn it off before installing the old
drive, but the old drive has it turned on, so I have no way to turn
it off on the old drive, unless I can turn off the wireless and not
use a network cable to force OF to not try and sync.

Now that you could repair things, leave the "OneNote notebooks
directories *OUT* of reach for Offline files. AS ON uses it's own
synching, synching via "Offline files" is good for nothing but spoiling
things.

Rainald

 

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/29/2008 5:56 PM, and on a whim, Rainald Taesler
pounded out on the keyboard:

Thanks for the follow-up. Really great news!
Congratulations.


Only too natural if she did what's necessary: Backup data regularly. ;-)
How current the data are depends on how regular backups have been made,
however.

See below. Backup isn't the issue.

Sorry, IMHO wrong assumptions again.
Everyone working in IT-support knows that the most un-reliable source
for information in case of troubles are the *users*.

I've been consulting for 14 years, and I can agree to some extent. I
also investigate thoroughly enough to come to that conclusion. This is
not the case here.

I'm sure that in the case given the user had done things which caused
the missing of the files in their default location. ON does not remove
the data files and/or move them without the user's command.

In order to avoid problems in the future, my advice would be to check
the settings for the storage of (a) date files (notebooks), (b) the
cache and (c) the backups and correct the paths in case the would be
wrong.
Go to "Tools | Options | Save".

I have been out of town for the last two days so that I could not reply
to your postings.
Ilya Koulchin has made a most valuable contribution to clear basic
things.
I'll check the whole thread in order to see if it might be useful to add
something in order to answer possibly open questions. Pls give me a day
or two.

Rainald

Rainald,

What do you think the user did? Delete the files in the default folder
on the network? Sorry, we have Shadowing enabled on the servers and I
went back through EVERY Previous Version of the users network folder and
the files were not in ONE version (well over a month of shadowing twice
per day). I'm also sure the user didn't have the files in another
location (I searched the old hard drive). The files in the Backup
folder were not originals, as they had the (last mod date).one appended
to the original name (even though the dates did not reflect data written
later within the file). The user never made a change from the defaults
in the program.

Can the backup location be changed in ON? I didn't check yesterday.
It's poor design to put any data backup in the AppData folders IMO. It
should be placed in the default data location.

--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/29/2008 6:06 PM, and on a whim, Rainald Taesler
pounded out on the keyboard:

As said in my previous reply, I'll carefully go through the whole thread
in order to check if their might open questions.
Prior to that - as it seems *urgent* to me - just a short note:


In general the One-notebook should *NOT* be part of the "Offline files"
mechanisms.
Synching with the "Offline files" features can seriously spoil things.


Now that you could repair things, leave the "OneNote notebooks
directories *OUT* of reach for Offline files. AS ON uses it's own
synching, synching via "Offline files" is good for nothing but spoiling
things.

Rainald

Like I said early on, I don't have any faith in the MS "caching"
technology. Offline Files is a horrible design, and we are moving to
other methods as quickly as possible. The caching of OneNote didn't
appear to be useful in this circumstance either.

Although we are not using Offline Files to sync from the laptop to the
server, we set My Documents on the server and sync to the laptop. This
way if/when Offline Files fails, we can go back and use the enabled
shadowing of the data to retrieve anything lost.



--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[David]

The backup location can be changed.

Menu: Tools-Options
Category: Save

The settings for the frequency and copy numbers of the backup are found in
Category: Backup

David Olsen
www.powerbits.com.au

 

[Terry R.]

The date and time was 10/30/2008 5:29 PM, and on a whim, David pounded
out on the keyboard:

The backup location can be changed.

Menu: Tools-Options
Category: Save

The settings for the frequency and copy numbers of the backup are found in
Category: Backup

David Olsen
www.powerbits.com.au

Thank you David.

--
Terry R.

***Reply Note***
Anti-spam measures are included in my email address.
Delete NOSPAM from the email address after clicking Reply.

 

[Rainald Taesler]

The backup location can be changed.

[...]

FWIW:
Not *only* the backup location can be changed!

The place where the notebooks are stored can be changed.

The place where the cache is stored can be chanced.

Only the place where ON system settings (Preferences.dat and
Toolbar.dat) are stored
(i.e.: %appdata%\Microsoft\OneNote\12.0\)
can not be changed (unless using a re-direction by means of "symbolic
links" [NTFS-links]).

Rainald

 

[Rainald Taesler]

Thank you David.

AFAICS we had that before!

Rainald

 

[Rainald Taesler]

Terry R. in (e-mail address removed) share these words
of wisdom:

As this affair has got really out of all reasonable boundaries, I need a
bit more time.
Pleeeease give me the weekend and in between leave me *without* further
theories on what might have happened and what not.

Now that you could repair things, leave the "OneNote notebooks
directories *OUT* of reach for Offline files. AS ON uses it's own
synching, synching via "Offline files" is good for nothing but
spoiling things.

[.]
Like I said early on, I don't have any faith in the MS "caching"
technology. Offline Files is a horrible design, and we are moving
to other methods as quickly as possible.

That's just at your command ;-)

The caching of OneNote
didn't appear to be useful in this circumstance either.

May be it just does "appear" to have not been so.
That's just due the "circumstances" <gbg>.
OneNote's caching is a most efficient construction.
It's not an instrument for "backing up data", however, nor for covering
users' mistakes.

Although we are not using Offline Files to sync from the laptop to
the server, we set My Documents on the server and sync to the
laptop.

Sorry, I do not understand what you might mean by this :-( :-(
What might have been synched from where to where under this scheme?

This way if/when Offline Files fails, we can go back and
use the enabled shadowing of the data to retrieve anything lost.

Not knowing how you did set up things (as said above), I can only repeat
what I said before:
Having the directory where the "OneNote notebooks" are sitting (be it
anywhere on a server or just in "My Documents" in the hierarchy of the
User-Profile [be it held locally or on a server]) included in any kind
of "synchronizing" mechanisms (like Offline files) will seriously
*spoil* things.
In so far "Offline files" is just one of the trouble-making instruments.

Rainald

 

[Rainald Taesler]

Are you still listening, Terry?

Terry R. in (e-mail address removed) share these words
of wisdom:


As this affair has got really out of all reasonable boundaries, I
need a bit more time.
Pleeeease give me the weekend and in between leave me *without*
further theories on what might have happened and what not.

I had promised to reply to possibly open questions.
Unfortunately it was too much and so several weekends went by.

If interested, I will write up what might be of value.
But only if you'd still interested.
Pls let me know.

Rainald

 

[Steve Silverwood]

I had promised to reply to possibly open questions.
Unfortunately it was too much and so several weekends went by.

I know the feeling. This is -=THE=- #1 newsgroup I visit whenever I
get time to spend on newsgroups, but sometimes there's either not
enough time or just too many other things to do. As I write this it's
just after 0300 Pacific time and I'm on my lunch break. (Laptops are
a godsend!!!)

//Steve//

Steve Silverwood, KB6OJS
Email: (e-mail address removed)
Web: http://kb6ojs.com