[Issue] Serious bug: Lost a file due to lack of disk-space

[strolog]

Hi all,

this is a very serious Open-Office bug and I hope it will be addressed.
When my macbook gets out of disk space (which is very easy when I
stream some video) and at the same time I am editing a file with
Open Office, I obviously cannot save the file. *BUT* instead of
accepting the fact that the file cannot be saved (and leave the old
version intact), what Open Office does is try save the file, it replaces
it with an empty file (zero bytes) and then informs me that the file
cannot be saved. The old version of the file has been destroyed in
the process !!! At the same time, I cannot open the newer version !!!!
It's a disaster. If you are lucky and Open Office doesn't crash, then
you may release some space and save the file. In my case
I was not able to save, even after I released some space. And while
I was in the process to release some more space, Open Office crashed.
Guess what? The files was gone ! Even the backup area had this file
with zero size !!! In other words, Open Office destroyed the file
and its backup, trying to save on a disk with no space left.
This is too serious (and sounds trivial to solve). I would be happy
to see that this problem is solved in one of the newer releases.
Also, I would appreciate any advice about how to recover the file
(although I know it is most probably impossible -- even the backup
file is gone).

Thank you very much,

John

[Hagar Delest]

Hi and welcome to the forum!

You should file a bug report: [Tutorial] Reporting bugs or suggestions.

[robleyd]

For file recovery, try this; as soon as possible do the following:

Download Recuva (Windows only) or PhotoRec for Win, MacOS, Linux and other OSes (only one needed) and let it do an in-depth recovery of deleted files on your computer. You may get a file containing some or all of your data (or not). Do this as a first priority; other use of the computer may overwrite any existing but deleted files and prevent their recovery. There is no guarantee that you will recover anything useful.

[John_Ha]

See [Tutorial] How to find and un-delete Writer temporary files for instructions on how to identify and un-delete the temporary files Writer wrote while you were editing the file, and then deleted. You should be able to recover your file as it was when you last opened or saved it, or as it was when it was last saved with AutoRecovery.

You may also find previous versions of the file in the folder it is located in, but which have since been deleted.

Edit: A thought: In your case recovery may be less likely as the method relies on un-deleting files which have been deleted. Deleted files remain on disk but are flagged as "available space which can be used". The method tries to recover them before they get re-used and overwritten. If you have little free space on your disk, it is highly probable that these files will get overwritten very quickly.

You should never run a PC with little or no free disk space as you are an accident looking for somewhere to happen. All programs are written on the assumption that there will be sufficient free disk space available. It's a bit like driving your car with no tyres and then complaining that it won't steer or brake well; or with no oil, and complaining the engine seizes. It's the driver's fault, not the car designer's fault and not the car's fault.

A good rule of thumb for a PC is to keep about 10% of the disk space free. A commercial environment with large databases might well keep 20% or more free.

[Bill]

I would be happy to see that this problem is solved in one of the newer releases.

The recruitment mailing list might be the place to start:

Get Involved in Apache OpenOffice

[strolog]

Hi all,

thanks for replies. I tried iSkysoft with no success.
(I tried the other instructions (mostly written for Windows)
before contacting the list).

The comparison with a car running with no oil or gas is not
a good one. If you run out of oil or gas, you don't want your
car to explode! You just want an indicator to let you know
so that you stop moving the car. Software should not cause
additional problems when it cannot run. It should just exit
graciously, without causing any disaster. This notion that
"I can either run with sufficient disk space (or any other
requirement) or I will ruin your files" is not a good programming
practice. Other editors (even emacs) never delete any open
files if there is no space to save! So, yes, this is a bug,
it is not a feature or a fact of life.

Thanks,

-J

[Zizi64]

OFF:
Why are you using
narrow text lines
on a so wide
Forum reply-area?

[eremmel]

Most software will fail in some way when disk is full it is very hard to test, except Operating systems and (commercial) databases.
Unix (and maybe iOS, for it is linux) reserve for the root-user extra disk space that cannot be used by normal users. So you might run OO under root account and your streaming application under a normal user account. This might be an escape for you.

[Bill]

This bug was reported in 2008. It has a P2 (trivial) priority and hasn't received any comments since 2012.

Issue 92377 - Document lost (0 ko) when the hard drive is full and you try to save it