Don't overwrite autosave of previous session
pretty nice, but there's one use case Blender is missing.
Problem
Last week I was working on a file. I forgot to save and closed my laptop without logging out or shutting down. Windows being Windows, it somehow restarted or shut down during the couple days I was away.
I get back to my desk and open my laptop. It shows me the login screen. I don't think much of it, log in, open Blender and open the file I was working on. I was working in it for a good 5 minutes before I realised there was animation data missing that I did last week.
Edit: I don't know exactly why I didn't have an autosave of my previous work anymore, so disregard the following.
But by now Blender has already overwritten the autosave of my last session , rendering hours of work lost.
Solution
Edit: Proposal based on wrong assumptions and misunderstanding. Ignore the following. The problem remains but the solution doesn't make sense.
I think this could be mitigated by simply keeping two sets of autosave :
- current session
- previous session ~~
10 Comments
I'm gonna say no. What you describe is user error - "I don't think much of it" , the software can't prevent all such things from happening, but... see below.
You mean it's not "Last Session" but "Auto Save", the last session 'quit.blend' is the file that is saved when you quit Blender under normal operation. So in your case it probably didn't happen.
The "Auto Save" is created for each file you work on, so saving two versions will double the amount of disk space occupied. And again, it is not guaranteed that this temporary files will be saved when the system is rebooted.
It's already a system that's too complex for the user: '.blend1' files, 'quit.blend' file, auto-saved files.
What can be done here. When Blender did not quit normally, the next time it starts up, show a pop-up with information that there is an auto-saved file and offer to open it.
I disagree with your user error comment. I'm far from the first person to have lost work in this manner. In good UI design we:
I like your alternative solution, it makes me think. To improve on the suggestion, Blender should probably compare the date of the opened file and the date of the last auto-save. If the latter is newer it should pause auto-saving and prompt the user like you said.
Maybe there's a better way, what if we do not prompt for file saving upon close? Just always open the quit.blend (if there is one) when blender opens.
I don't think you fully understand that there are two existing methods that Blender uses to backup files. What most new users typically notice, is that there is always a second file that ends with ".blend1" this file saves the previously saved version of the file when you overwrite your working file with new changes. It's easy to just go grab it if you realize that you just saved something, that somehow got rid of or modified something you wanted to keep.
The other system is found by going to the File menu, and go down below New Open, etc; you will see "Recover". Once you click that, it will take you into a Blender temporary directory, where it auto saves files in the background while you are working, BEFORE you even press save. So if you have been working for two hours and have forgotten to hit Ctrl+S up tp that point, no problem? Just Recover the last autosave. The amount of time between autosaves is controlled with the Blender's Preferences. I typically set it to every 1-2 minutes.
Disclaimer: I'm not defending my proposal anymore as it's actually a complicated matter.
You don't fully understand the issue. I believe the problem stems from the PC restarting, clearing autosave files somehow. But the exact rules are still unknown to me. I just have to get used to Windows being dogshit and always manually saving everything, quitting all apps and manually shutting down the PC before leaving it alone.
Autosave already does this though? Every autosave file is timestamped, and it only overwrites ones from the current session.
Are you taking about the .Blend1 files?
No, about the autosaves ;) docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/troubleshooting/recover.html
I am very confused then because the autosave appends the timestamp to every file so that it doesn't override an older one.
Proposal edited. Seems like I'm missing information about how autosave actually works. But I did find this warning at the bottom of the page I linked you.
So maybe we both don't fully understand?
This is only applies to the current session afaik and from my experience. I.e if you close and open blender it will create new autosaves while keeping the old ones. Essentially if your computer restarted that means the blender session has ended, so I don't see how it could have overwritten after you started a new session. But ask a dev to clarify just to make sure.