Pages doc lost (tried everything to recover it)

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Level 1

4 points

Pages doc lost (tried everything to recover it)

Hello,

When updating pages, I lost the last modifications to my pages document. It represents hours of works. I was working on the cloud, I thought it was the best way to make sure my doc is safe. But I was wrong. When they asked me to update Pages, I didn't do it at first and I continued to work for hours. Then I had a message telling me the doc isn't sync anymore. I was connected to internet but still didn't sync the doc. So I pressed "Cmd + s" and started the update of pages.

When I launched it again, all the changes were gone. I thought it wasn't that bad, there a copy somewhere, in a temp file or using "restore previous versions". But I was surprised to see my doc hasn't any previous versions, even I'v been working on this donc for months. Here is a screenshot.

I tried some apps to recover lost files, I tried going to my iCloud docs. There is nothing to be found. It's probably definitely lost, and I'm very angry at apple for not having any kind of backup for safety when updating the Pages app.

Of course my Time Machine wasn't configured, it could have saved me. But since it's made for local docs, I'm sure it would have helped for docs in the cloud.

My error are : I thought every time I pressed cmd + s I had a local copy saved. When I pressed it, I had no message telling me it didn't worked, so I assumed everything was fine. I also regret not checking I had no previous versions available, why so ?

If someone has a miracle solution, I'm all ear.

Armand

[Edited by Moderator]

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 15.0

Posted on Sep 28, 2024 12:48 AM

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Answer 1

Sep 28, 2024 7:10 AM in response to ArmandTich

If you are using a Cloud service other than Apple's iCloud, your document may be gone, though check with that service provider about your options for recovery. Apple does not guarantee that a save or autosave operation will succeed on filesystems/Cloud services other than those provided by Apple. Usually, autosave will present an obvious dialog when it has an issue doing so.

Apple's iCloud is not a backup service (that is what Time Machine is for), but does offer a 30-day sliding timeframe to restore deleted documents. See if Recover deleted files on iCloud.com - Apple Support helps.

I have never had any Pages update on macOS, iOS, or iPadOS — delete any documents.

When you start a new document, even before you enter content, save it to a meaningful filename instead of the default Untitled.pages. Remember where you saved it as Pages will continue to use that filesystem location until you change the save location. After the first document is saved, Pages enables autosave, and like cmd+s, it does not provide any notification that the document has been saved. Autosave works whenever there are changes to the document and on the local drive, occurs within 10 seconds, and a few seconds longer over the network to iCloud Drive.

If you have enabled Spotlight to index the Documents category, then you may still be able to find the Pages document on your local drive from either a Finder Window search field or the menu bar 🔍 Spotlight tool. The following says show me all Pages documents that were modified after (>) Sept 1.

kind:pages modified:>09/01/2024

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Answer 2

ArmandTich Author

Level 1

4 points

Sep 29, 2024 3:22 PM in response to VikingOSX

Hello,

Thanks for those tips. Alas it didn't work. There isn't anything anywhere. For a reason I don't understand, there isn't any local file, despite the fact I pressed Cmd + S like every 5 minutes, literally, and I always thought it was saving my file somewhere locally.

I don't understand either why my doc doesn't have any previous version, and I've been working on it for almost a year from the same computer (+ iPad from time to time).

I don't if it's because of the update or if there was something wrong before that. But when I had the message to update and refused it, and the doc wasn't sync anymore (I was offline on the train so that's normal). And when I arrived to my hotel, I was connected again but it wasn't synchronizing. I pressed cmd + s and started the update hoping to resolve that, and that's when I lost my work.

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