Hi. Over the last several days I've been working on some illustrations and both files have disappeared for no reason. I'm working on a 2020 M1 Macbook Pro - 13-inch, with the touchbar (if that makes a difference). TLDR: I've lost two .ai files (over 10 hours of work) which I'm sure I saved. I looked in every conceivable place they could have gone, including the trash bin and a full system search, combing through all .ai files on my machine. One disappeared within 20 minutes of saving the file. The next one disappeared (after saving) when I restarted my mac (in an effort to get the first file back) without actually closing the Illustrator project. THE DETAILS: Things I'm Sure OfThe files were saved before I closed Illustrator.There was nothing unusual about the files. I did not use any third-party plugins that might have messed with them. All shapes and elements in the file were created inside Illustrator except the JPEG I used to trace some elements. The only things that may have been different was that I used the built-in iPhone X artboard size template (I usually just type in the exact dimensions I want.) and that I used the Film Grain texture, something I've never actually used before. What HappenedThe first time: I had been working on the illustration all morning. I saved, exported to PNG, and air-dropped the image to my iPhone 11. I may have closed Illustrator (I don't remember, because I wasn't worried about it at the time.) About 20 minutes later, I noticed that the file wasn't on my desktop where I saved it, so I searched my mac for the file. When I couldn't find it I just searched ".ai" and scanned every .ai project on my machine. Nothing. So I opened illustrator and it wasn't in the "Recent" section. I checked my trash bin. Not there. The only evidence I have that the project ever existed is the PNG that I saved and sent to myself. Otherwise, it's as if it never existed. That was yesterday, July 26, 2021, at about 11 AM.The second time: After deciding to cut my losses, I started a new Illustrator project for a new illustration (since I at least had the finished product of the one I lost). I worked on it for several hours, saved, and went to bed. This morning (July 27, 2021, at about 8 AM) I woke up, opened my laptop, and the new project was still sitting open on my computer. I realized that the one thing I hadn't tried to recover my lost file was to restart my computer. So I hit CMD + S to save and restarted my mac via the apple logo at the top left. To be clear, I restarted the machine without first closing Illustrator. That may have been a mistake, but I thought since I'd saved multiple times, it should be fine. Wrong. I logged back in after the restart to find my brand new .ai file missing just like the first one. Further Details:I tried to find the autosave file. I eventually found a file path that led to a folder called "data-recovery" or something like that, but it was completely empty. In fact, it seems that it's never autosaved any project.... Problem? Yeah, probably. I looked in my Creative Cloud Documents folder even though I have syncing turned off (for reasons that aren't important). No surprise, it's not there. I'll probably turn on syncing now.At one point, I had named the first document the same name as another document, planning to delete the old document and replace it with the new one. At first I thought that maybe it was user error and I had simply deleted the wrong file, but in that case it would have shown up in my trash bin, which it didn't.I have a habit of saving all .ai files to my desktop and moving them to a project folder later, when I've finished the project. Based on this habit, it's unlikely that I saved it elsewhere unless the initial Save-As dialogue box automatically suggested a different folder and I didn't notice. But either way, I did a full system search for the file name and for all .ai files (in case I'd misremembered the name) and neither showed up.The JPEGs that I used to trace in each document are still on my desktop, as is the exported PNG of the first file, which I mention to prove that I'm not just insane or that I didn't just vividly dream that I did the project. Lol. Please help. I feel insane. Anyway... I've now lost over 10 hours of work on two separate files, seemingly with no hope of recovery. And now I'm scared to start any new projects, which is a problem because I'm a graphic designer. Please help if you think I've missed something or if you have some advice or idea which isn't covered already. Sorry for the long post. I figure details will save time in the long run. Thank you for your time and any help you can provide!

Participant

Question

Illustrator Files Disappearing - Even After Save

Forum|Forum|4 years ago
July 27, 2021
7 replies
11105 views

Hi. Over the last several days I've been working on some illustrations and both files have disappeared for no reason. I'm working on a 2020 M1 Macbook Pro - 13-inch, with the touchbar (if that makes a difference).

TLDR: I've lost two .ai files (over 10 hours of work) which I'm sure I saved. I looked in every conceivable place they could have gone, including the trash bin and a full system search, combing through all .ai files on my machine. One disappeared within 20 minutes of saving the file. The next one disappeared (after saving) when I restarted my mac (in an effort to get the first file back) without actually closing the Illustrator project.

THE DETAILS:

Things I'm Sure Of

The files were saved before I closed Illustrator.
There was nothing unusual about the files. I did not use any third-party plugins that might have messed with them.
All shapes and elements in the file were created inside Illustrator except the JPEG I used to trace some elements.
The only things that may have been different was that I used the built-in iPhone X artboard size template (I usually just type in the exact dimensions I want.) and that I used the Film Grain texture, something I've never actually used before.

What Happened

The first time: I had been working on the illustration all morning. I saved, exported to PNG, and air-dropped the image to my iPhone 11. I may have closed Illustrator (I don't remember, because I wasn't worried about it at the time.) About 20 minutes later, I noticed that the file wasn't on my desktop where I saved it, so I searched my mac for the file. When I couldn't find it I just searched ".ai" and scanned every .ai project on my machine. Nothing. So I opened illustrator and it wasn't in the "Recent" section. I checked my trash bin. Not there. The only evidence I have that the project ever existed is the PNG that I saved and sent to myself. Otherwise, it's as if it never existed. That was yesterday, July 26, 2021, at about 11 AM.
The second time: After deciding to cut my losses, I started a new Illustrator project for a new illustration (since I at least had the finished product of the one I lost). I worked on it for several hours, saved, and went to bed. This morning (July 27, 2021, at about 8 AM) I woke up, opened my laptop, and the new project was still sitting open on my computer. I realized that the one thing I hadn't tried to recover my lost file was to restart my computer. So I hit CMD + S to save and restarted my mac via the apple logo at the top left. To be clear, I restarted the machine without first closing Illustrator. That may have been a mistake, but I thought since I'd saved multiple times, it should be fine. Wrong. I logged back in after the restart to find my brand new .ai file missing just like the first one.
Further Details:
- I tried to find the autosave file. I eventually found a file path that led to a folder called "data-recovery" or something like that, but it was completely empty. In fact, it seems that it's never autosaved any project.... Problem? Yeah, probably.
- I looked in my Creative Cloud Documents folder even though I have syncing turned off (for reasons that aren't important). No surprise, it's not there. I'll probably turn on syncing now.
- At one point, I had named the first document the same name as another document, planning to delete the old document and replace it with the new one. At first I thought that maybe it was user error and I had simply deleted the wrong file, but in that case it would have shown up in my trash bin, which it didn't.
- I have a habit of saving all .ai files to my desktop and moving them to a project folder later, when I've finished the project. Based on this habit, it's unlikely that I saved it elsewhere unless the initial Save-As dialogue box automatically suggested a different folder and I didn't notice. But either way, I did a full system search for the file name and for all .ai files (in case I'd misremembered the name) and neither showed up.
- The JPEGs that I used to trace in each document are still on my desktop, as is the exported PNG of the first file, which I mention to prove that I'm not just insane or that I didn't just vividly dream that I did the project. Lol. Please help. I feel insane.

Anyway... I've now lost over 10 hours of work on two separate files, seemingly with no hope of recovery. And now I'm scared to start any new projects, which is a problem because I'm a graphic designer. Please help if you think I've missed something or if you have some advice or idea which isn't covered already.

Sorry for the long post. I figure details will save time in the long run. Thank you for your time and any help you can provide!

Bug

A

allison_5274

Participant

I have been working on the same file for the last week and after a crash 2 files are now missing. I cannot find them anywhere despite having saved both files multipple times over the last few days.

It's beyond disappointing

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @allison_5274,

I'm sorry to hear about your experience. Could you provide some details about the version of the OS/Illustrator installed, the circumstances under which these files were saved or edited, and the location of the files where they were stored, so we can better assist you?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

M

Mr.Harding-student

Participant

girl same help my friend is fully with sorrow from the same accident.

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @Mr.Harding-student, @ANDRES NOYA,

Would you mind sharing more details, like the version of the OS/Illustrator installed and if this only happens when saving to a specific storage location like a removable/network drive or a cloud-synced folder like Google Drive/iCloud Drive/etc. so I can better assist you?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Anubhav

A

ANDRES NOYA

Participant

Hoy enero 2025, y aun siguen esos errores, guardo los archivos y a los 2 dias ya no estan. Muy extraño y le ocurre a muchos conocidos.

Sin embargo, me he dado cuenta que si guardo los archivos en una usb, a los días cuando intento encontrar los archivos en la usb no hay ningun archivo. Pero si uso la usb en un windows, si me aparecen los archivos. Ahora se vuelve mas raro, porque los archivos si estan solo que Mac no los detecta.

Sera algun problema de incompatibilidad con los sistemas operativos MAC?

C

Cornelius33942559112e

Participating Frequently

This sounds like a major bug with illustrator. I know multiple other users who are dealing with the same issue. All when saving directly onto disk. It's almost as if illustrator deletes the files after saving.

Monika Gause

Community Expert

@Cornelius33942559112e schrieb:

This sounds like a major bug with illustrator. I know multiple other users who are dealing with the same issue. All when saving directly onto disk. It's almost as if illustrator deletes the files after saving.

When you open your files and the latest changes did not get saved, of course you need to check the disk.

But also in the Illustrator preferences turn off "Save in background".

Flygprestanda

Participant

Same here, I save my files religiously when working, I save them both locally and in the Clous. Every change I make I save. But now for some reason Illustrator has, indeed saved my file, but an old version. So all my icons are completely gone except for the first two I made. Beyond frustrating

Anubhav M

Community Manager

Hello @flygprestadagraphics,

Sorry to hear about this experience. Would you mind trying to revert to a different version of your cloud document (https://adobe.ly/3SHPcsh) and checking if it helps?

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Thanks,

Anubhav

R

radhikan82884504

Participant

Even my files have been disappearing just like this! AI and EPS files go missing! Is it because of the update??!

studioorileyAuthor

Participant

UPDATE:

I managed to get the second file back! Somehow, it was in the "data-recovery" folder. The first one is still completely missing, but at least this one is back.

NOTE:

I'm not sure if the auto-save feature is what saved me... or if I accidentally "Save As"ed the file to the Data Recovery folder, since I had opened it looking for my other file. It's possible that it was set as the save location and that auto-save still isn't working. It was the only file in there, and I thought autosave saved multiple file versions over the course of the file's life. So I still don't know if that's working or not.

Monika Gause

Community Expert

The data recovery only works when it's turned on. And it only keeps files when Illustrator crashes or is forced to quit. Data recovery is not a backup and should never be used as that. Never ever. Data recovery also might fail (in cases of power outages, hardware fails or whatever).

You need a proper file handling strategy.

You need a proper naming strategy.

You need a proper backup strategy.

Oh, and maybe turn on Time Machine.

Also: restart your computer regularly - these things are not made for running days, weeks, months or years. And before restaring, shut down the applications. You need to be much more careful about your files.

C

ClearRange

Participant

What has changed, and what is the Adobe software doing that ti did not do before? And please don't tell me that I need to be "much more careful about (my) files".

I am sure everyone appreciates that one needs a proper file handling strategy. On the other hand, since part of a good strategy is to avoid software that makes files disappear, how about a more serious answer that throwing the problem back at the user. I am doing nothing different than normal, and I also have had two files disappear.

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