How to prevent losing a post you've typed out and other typed data

[Bruce Achterberg]

Moltar, a member of the forums, recently said this in a thread he made:

I just wrote a long post [...], but while I was writing it my session expired and I was logged out. So I lost everyt[h]ing. I don't feel like re-writing it (took me 25 minutes) [...]

Source: The Food Timing Diet

Have you ever been in the same situation? You take your time to painstakingly type out something in a forum post window or some sort of text entry form only to lose it due to an issue with the internet browser, something accidental, a power failure, or something else that is mostly out of your control (such as a pet or young child turning off your computer at the power switch or having your computer/laptop power cord pulled out)?

Well, if you have, I certainly feel your pain. I frequently write lengthy posts (either here or on other forums), and I've lost my fair share of typing from some sort of external influence outside of my control, so I know how frustrating it can be. After it happened enough times, since I really dislike re-typing something that I've already written (as I often forget a lot of the good ideas or information I included typing it out a second time), I finally decided to do something about it and reclaim my lost time (or, at least, prevent wasting time having to re-type something in the first place).


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From posting in text-entry windows to Microsoft Word
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Now, instead of writing/typing out posts (and other documents) in a not-so-secure posting window, I write them in Microsoft Word (word processing software) and copy the work once I'm done and paste it wherever I need it. This generally stops things like session timeout, program instability, and accidentally closing a browser window from causing you to lose all of your work, and as an added advantage, you also get inbuilt spell-checking functionality (plus it's always nice being able see what you've typed in full screen so you can go through and edit it with ease instead of being forced to use a text entry window that’s less then a quarter of your monitor screen size).

Additionally, depending on the length of what I'm typing and whether or not the information in it is important to me or not, I may opt to save the work on my computer (either temporarily until you have posted/published the work or permanently for later reference). This is generally the safest option, since it prevents you from losing your work due to things such as power failures (although a UPS can also help with that), BSODs, computer freezes/crashes, and random meteor showers.


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Making use of a temporary document and saving work often
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Sometimes I save work in a new Word file, or I make use of a singular "Temporary Writing" Word document that I use for the sole purpose of storing writing/typing temporarily. To be more specific, what I do with the Temporary Writing document is use it to write out what I have, make use of the ability to save my progress (so I can always finish it off later if I get interrupted), and then when it's finished, I simply copy and paste it wherever I need it. Using this method I can also start something and finish it later, and I find it helpful to write out any ideas or information I wanted to include in point form at the bottom of the document so I don't forget anything when I finish it later.

When I want to type something else that is unrelated to what I was previously typing, I simply delete what was in the document, and start the process over again. This prevents you from cluttering up your hard drive with different documents (that you use for writing posts, etc.) that you don't necessarily want to keep, and while writing something, if you do decide you want to keep it you can always go to "save as" in the file menu and then you are free to use your Temporary document for other writing.

Since I've started doing this I very rarely lose anything I'm writing, although it is important to remember to save often. When it comes to writing in Word I don't think you can overuse the save shortcut (Ctrl + S), and I use it frequently. Usually I make it a habit to save every paragraph or so, or when I know I've written out information that I don't want to lose.


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What do you do if you don't have Microsoft Word? Is there a free alternative?
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If you don't have Microsoft Word and don't want to pay to get it, you can use the freeware word processing software from OpenOffice.org (which you can download free of charge and is available for both Mac and IBM-type PCs). The software is very similar to Microsoft Word and should serve your needs just fine. To quote their website:

OpenOffice.org is a multiplatform and multilingual office suite and an open-source project. Compatible with all other major office suites, the product is free to download, use, and distribute.

If I didn't already have Microsoft Word and it's trusty companion, NotePad, OpenOffice is what I'd be using.


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Share your own tips and tricks for preventing loss of data
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So, that's how I do it - how do you prevent losing what taken time to type out? Feel free to reply to this thread and share your methods, tips, tricks, and even word processing (or other) software that you've found to be useful in the process data loss pretension.

[Erki]

I would use good ol' Notepad, just make sure you hit CTRL+S every once in a while. Word's autosave has some 10 minute intervals anyway so it doesn't make too big difference.

[Markus74]

If you've got a 'GMail' (Google Mail) account then you've got also access to 'Google Docs', an online word processor who also saves automatically every minute or so. Very neat.

[Alvin]

My quickest idea, always hit CTRL+A to select all the text that I've written, then CTRL+C to copy it to temp memory, so if the post is lost, all I need to do is go back and paste it.

[Markus74]

Originally Posted by Alvin

My quickest idea, always hit CTRL+A to select all the text that I've written, then CTRL+C to copy it to temp memory, so if the post is lost, all I need to do is go back and paste it.

Good idea, but that doesn't help you if you lose electricity!

[febflake]

Some browsers can disable (well the page's author) the use of ctrl-c. If the browser crashes, windows might clean up what was in the buffer. Best advice is to use notepad. Oh and Firefox 2.0 has a feature that restores form fields content if it crashes or if you close the browser.

[andrew]

Originally Posted by Alvin

My quickest idea, always hit CTRL+A to select all the text that I've written, then CTRL+C to copy it to temp memory, so if the post is lost, all I need to do is go back and paste it.

I do the same thing

[Sadhana]

Originally Posted by Alvin

My quickest idea, always hit CTRL+A to select all the text that I've written, then CTRL+C to copy it to temp memory, so if the post is lost, all I need to do is go back and paste it.

Yup. Same here.

[Greg]

Yup - do a copy of all the text before pressing the post button and that should save you a lot of pain.

[Jehosephat]

Another great (but not free) tool is MS OneNote. It's similar to Word except that it autosaves constantly. I wish I had it when I was still in school. You can try it for 30 days downloadable from MS.

[Keith]

Y'know, I've often thought that your webbrowser should do this for you. Perhaps someone with some coding skill could add this feature to Firefox (as a plugin, perhaps?).

[TechnoGuyRob]

Firefox is the best possible choice you could think of. It restores whatever you typed (in all your form fields in all tabs) whenever the browser crashes. No need for third party programs. Just a browser that works how it should.

[Michael Chui]

Amen. I also synch it with Google Notebook.

[copla]

I just hit apple-a apple-c every once in a while so I have it ready to paste if something goes wrong.

[The Universal Call]

Greg: Indeed, and as far as I can see many use this technique.

What made me more careful in my Internet-posting was an incident over at Astral Society. I took a great deal time replying to a person, and when I was done I saw this feature they had. "Spell check? Oh, great! *click-aly-click*...*waiting* But... Where did? Go? Damn!" Considering I was only replying an inane question and as Bruce A mentions one could do; I had lost my train of thought, so I didn't re-write the reply. After this incident I always make sure to select the entire text (oddly I don't use ctrl + a for this) and press ctrl... and then slowly put my finger on the "c" button (because for God sake, the x button is right next to it! No, the horror!).

Once in a while however I use Microsoft Word, not only for autosaving properties but in MS I find it that much easier to organize and edit my text.

[Michael Chui]

Heh... there's nothing wrong with doing a Cut. Just paste it back in immediately.

[Brutha]

I like Operas Note feature. The browser doubles as text editor and you can press Crtl+Alt+C to save text to Notes.

[SamBeaven]

Another vote right here for Firefox, the session restore is fantastic. And as an additional hint, if you type 'about:config' in your address bar and set browser.startup.page to 3, it'll restore tabs every time it opens and not just when it crashes, which is fantastically useful if you're an idiot like me and occasionally quite apps by accident.

[toby]

This is my first post. I came to the site because a search about the timing diet led me here, but I started reading the posts about how to prevent losing what you've typed in. With Windows, hitting control + z undoes the last action.

Say you are typing a letter, and by mistake you hit a key, and the entire letter has disappeared. Try control +z and most likely your letter will be back again.

This is a lot easier than writing in Word and copying -- although that works too.

[Shaden]

I write everything in Microsoft Word and print it out once finished. That way one whenever I open my folder, I'm reminded of what I've achieved in so far and can't help getting excited about what the future holds for me.