P: Auto-Save/Recovery function

If Adobe does this, they shouldn't save multiple files, but instead save the original file, and then only add the changes from version to version, much like that one feature in ZFS, that I can't for the life of me remember the name of.

I had a bad luck to see the new auto-save/recovery feature at work already, and I must say that I feel much secure now! It automatically restore my work when I opened PS after a restart.

However, there is still one thing that doesn't leave my mind.

The image is being backed up into a single file over and over. What if the computer freezes when that recovery file is being updated? That will probably mean that it will get corrupted...

Is it not too much if I ask you for one more step to further improve the protection?

Please allow us to specify a number of recover files 1-5 which would be saved in a loop one after another in a set time interval.

For example I specified 2 recovery files and a 10 min interval. After 10 mins the backup would be saved into file *01, after 20 mins into file *02, after 30 mins, again into file *01 etc.

That would make it crash proof for certain. And we would also have a selection of backup states if we need to go a step back.

Thank you!
Alex

Is there any chance that Photoshop could start auto-saving to a temporary file periodically so if your laptop/computer/etc crashes or gets trampled in an elephant stampede, you don't lose everything you've worked on for hours/days? Microsoft Office does it. Google Chrome does it. Please make it a default background program.

Thank you!

Please please pleeeeeeeease add a recovery feature to photoshop!!! I know i am not the only one, but many times there are unfortunate accidents, whether it be a power outage or some other form of misfotrune, and the program closes. Please add a recovery feature found in text programs or such where one can continue where they left off. This would be the BEST feature yet, thank you. - Harold Cruz

This is excellent. One of the major roadblocks to saving frequently is that PS locks the UI once a save starts. If a user can save and then resume working on an image, this is a real step forward. Users don't save frequently because it interrupts their work. Make the process easier, and users will save more often.

Protecting History would also be a form of journaling. History is already a journal, and despite past comments on the difficulty of doing it, the fact is that journaling is already there. The real question is how to integrate History into relaunching the application after a crash to bring a user back to a snapshot. Another way to look at Autosave is the idea of saving snapshots of the image at periodic time or operation intervals and make recovery to a desired snapshot possible after a relaunch.

I'm glad to see that Adobe seems to be responding to this need after all.

Yes. Background Save should enable those types of things. Stay tuned. 🙂

If that's true, then why not implement it for Flash and Illustrator? Illustrator crashes a lot on me, so I'd like some sort of crash protection. (I make some really detailed vectors and store lots of reference images before dumping them.)

@Jeffrey

Cool! Considering that is it possible to also do any of the following:

1. Save documents that are idle for X amount of time where X is settable by the user?

2. Protect History/ New Presets in the event of a crash. (How much history in the event of a crash could be settable as well).

3. Save documents at certain intervals by the user? (As an option)

Mostly the auto save is protection from a crash, yes? Can Adobe take it that one step further to make the protection possible?

I know those things have been previously done, so it can't be that difficult to implement them off of preexisting models.

Check out this sneak featuring Background Save:

The only way to avoid the full data hit of journaling would be to get rid of pixels and use only vectors or go to just parametric editing (ala Lightroom).
As long as you can do arbitrary operations on pixels, you've got a lot of data to move around, and the only way to store all results is to store the pixels.

Also, armchair development works less often than armchair quarterbacking.