Photoshop files completely disappearing

This IS a thing! It happened to me as well. I'm running an iMac and a Cintiq, and 12 of my layered Photoshop files vanished off a ScanDisk flash drive. Poof. Exactly as happened to your students. Not an IT situation, and it is scary. My computer was in sleep mode while it happened to me. 

@Johar32253024yt1l  The Home Screen is the most common reason people "lose" files. I would certainly not recommend relying on that for anything.

The Home screen is not a file browser. It's just a passive link to the location of the file when first saved. It is not a link to the file itself. If the file is moved or deleted in a proper file browser, the Home screen is not updated. The link just goes dead, and so people mistakenly think the file has "disappeared".

The recent files list in the home screen is a convenience feature. The intended use is to let you quickly pick up where you left off before lunch. It is not intended for file management.

The other reason for losing files, is working directly over a network connection. That is not supported and not recommended. Do so at your own risk.

Good Morning All. The first way is by going to File > Open Recent, where a list of your recent files will appear. You can click on any of these files to open the document, regardless of where it's saved. The second way is from the Photoshop start screen. Thank You

I am not on any network and I am having the same problem. PSD files disappearing no where to be found. dozens and dozens of them. What gives?

HI Kevin, I will try that today (although with the 3-day wknd I'll have to check Tuesday when we come back to school). They are saving them locally. But, as mentioned, this literally started this week. I'll do what you suggested to make sure the files are there and have the students save, log out, then log back in to check, then I'll check again when we return Tuesday. Thank you

Not trying to pass the buck but this really does sound like something your IT enabled or manages that is affecting these files. Do the computers have enough HD free space for storage? 

Where are you saving the files? Local HD or some shared storage solution?

Here is a good test to try:

1. Save a file locally
2. Log out of the computer
3. Log back in
4. Confirm file is there (or not). If the file IS there, log out and leave overnight.
5. Check back the next day to confirm file is there. If it is gone, that means a policy is running overnight affecting the computers/accounts/storage.

They have their own school log-ins with personal email, etc, so that another students cannot see their "desktop" or work, which is saved on their desktop. I will have the students start also saving their work to their Google Drive, but our IT guy just told me they will only hold 20GB, so that is something to consider when they students work on huge layered files and incorporate many elements into their designs. But I read another person's issu on the forum that said his students were saving their work to both the local desktop and their Google Drives, but the files that would disappear (or some of them) were from the desktop files?? So strange!

I am not in that room right now where the computers are, but I know that he upgraded the MACS to the newest MAC and OS so that we could do the Adobe Certification tests seamlessly this year. We had older MACS prior to this year that couldn't be upgraded any more, so they got new ones. BUT, this issue literally just started this week. Had never ever happened before.

They have to log into their computer with their personal Google info, so they cannot see another student's work who may use the same computer later, because they too have their own log-in.

There is nothing in Photoshop or Adobe software that would remove files from a local HD. Do your students have to log in to the computer or are they shared with other students throughout the day?