A bug in the saving system of Illustrator

[Brammeleuris]

So this dawned on me today. My entire .ai file for my work records where gone.

What happened was is that i had a file named something like "Week records"

And was designing a cover for it. I know its unorthodox but i named the file with a / in it. So the name for the cover was "Cover/Week records".

As soon as i saved it it overwrote the "Week records" file instantly without a prompt. it lost the "Cover" from the name and just basically replaced my "Week records" file.

I know i cant get the files back. And luckily i have a backup. I have been able to reproduce this after the fact multiple times.

Has anyone else seen this happen? I am posting this here because i dont really know where else to post bugs.

[SJRiegel]

I don't think this is an Illustrator bug at all. Your "unorthodox" file name character is unorthodox for a reason.

Your computer OS uses the slash to designate a file's location in the hierarchy.

When you name a file as Cover/Week records, your OS interprets this as meaning:  a file called Week records in a folder called Cover.  

That is why you are getting the result you are seeing. The only way to avoid this is to stop using slashes in your file names.

[meganchi · Accepted solution]

This isn't really a bug, but part of the unix coding in Mac systems. A slash traditionally indicates a folder path structure.

You named a file with a common illegal filename character.

Don't use slashes in your filename...ever. See what characters to avoid below to save yourself some headaches.

https://www.mtu.edu/umc/services/digital/writing/characters-avoid/

[Brammeleuris]

Thankyou for the help. I know it was my own fault and that i shouldnt have named my file like that. Im sorry for mislabeling the post

[Monika Gause]

In the old times operating systems prevented you from putting slashes, backslashes or colons into file names.

Good ol' days ...

[Mike_Gondek]

You can report that here.

Feature Request/Bug Report Form

Not much Adobe can do as the issue is more of an OS (unix roots)  issue than Adobe, and most people know not to use that characters in filenames especially if they ever worked in a  workplace with an IT dept.

Is the past the bullet "•" interfered with Mac OSX when it first came out making your files invisible. Currently warn you against these characters that are easily accessible via the keyboard

: - colon

/ - forward slash

\ - backslash

. - period

% - percent

# - pound

I  addtionally advise to not use those characters in naming anything (layers, layer comps, swatches, graphic styles, etc). eg: there was a problem in Photoshop where layers comps would not export

In the past you may have heard not to use dashes or parenthesis, that is old news and safe to use.You may confuse someone if you begin to use en or em dashes that does asset management, so would be courteous to avoid those.

[Mike_Gondek]

Below is a recent post where the degree ° symbol was an issue.

Non-Latin Characters

[jaym85408297]

Some software actually validates inputs to help avoid issues.

I guess Illustrator treats you as infallible and blindly accepts your inputs.