Corrupted document

[lady88]

I wrote 145 pages of a book. The file got corrupted on the last pages. When I click to open, it goes through the ASCII filter and then shows #####. Bad news is that it was saved in .doc, not .odt format.

History: The computer was frozen on that word file and youtube channel, and even the task manager was not dismissing them all. So I pressed the shut down button of the computer while the word file was open. When I restarted, the file was corrupted.

I use Windows 10, PC. A at the time of the incident I had apache version 4.1.2. After, when my file was corrupted, I deleted the apache 4.12 and installed apache 4.1.3. Still no help. I can't find a back-up file. I don't know how to convert to zip and zip out either.

My hope is, that when I click on the file icon, it shows 9 MG which means the content is not deleted (good news). It had images and laborous tables and texts. Help if you can. I need to submit the book tomorrow. Thank you kindly.

[RoryOF]

Your file has been damaged. Waste no time in looking at it.
As soon as possible do the following:

Download Recuva or PhotoRec (only one needed) and let it do an indepth 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.

Do the above soonest!

Most likely there is nothing usable in your corrupt file, but if you upload it or its URL where it is on a file sharing site someone will have a look.

Edit: With a file of that size, it might, just barely _might _ , be possible to recover some of the content - perhaps the graphics, but it all depends... Have you made backups at stages along the writing of the file?

[lady88]

Can the copy of file be opened by another computer?

[RoryOF]

Not if the file is damaged - any recovery needs forensic examination.

[lady88]

I tried Recuva, as advised. It did not locate any file closer to that kind. All it viewed were very old files from the last month. I still hope that I can approach to that file. Rewriting is like a suicide. The file size shows that the content is still there. I hope you have a solution. I was writing this book for a few cents. Do not have funds for purchasing expensive recovery wares.

[lady88]

If I will recover the text only, that would be great. I can install the pictures later, not a big deal. I tried to open that file through notepad and wordpad, nothing helped. OMG.

[RoryOF]

The expensive recovery wares of which you write will not do more than we can. Upload the file to a filesharing site and post the URL here.

As a writer myself I can assure you that a rewrite, laborious and traumatic as it may be, produces a better product.

[lady88]

I think I was simply hacked. The file was stolen. Period.

[lady88]

Rewriting is out of the question. It is 5 am and I can't sleep until I find some solution. I recall a detail that could be defining. Before the computer would get frozen, an OpenOffice window appeared asking to update my account info, to input my name. I quickly put some initials, not taking the accuracy seriously. That file was opened for many consecutive days, and the Open Office updates where not being installed because I did not turn the PC off over those days. That window, asking to update my profile info, was a new thing: never happened before.

The crash happened after that so-called "update" of my name. Hence, it is a possibility that the Apache does not recognize the file. However, like I mentioned above, I uninstalled the Apache 4.1.2 and installed the new version 4.1.3 hoping this would help. Apache does open my other .doc files, though.

[RoryOF]

It is likely that, if your computer and the file were "opened for many consecutive days", that a memory leak caused the computer to crash. I fear your file is lost, unless there are some usable remnants in the remaining damaged file.

[lady88]

What does "is lost" mean? I see the file, I see its size. I just need an access to it. Anybody, please help. I am dying.

[RoryOF]

An OpenOffice file is an archive composed of several housekeeping and descriptive files. Of these, the important one containing the text is content.xml. When the archive is corrupted, as can happen in the circumstances you describe, one or more of these files is damaged. There are two main situations - the archive itself is damaged or the important file content.xml has not been properly written to disk. On or other of these situations applies (probably the latter); the archive holds its size because it was in process of construction; it has prepared space for content.xml, but that content was not written into the archive because the computer closed down during the writing process. Using Recuva you have checked that there are no erased temporary files used in the construction of the archive. It is just possible, but unlikely, that there may be some text in content.xml, but without access to the file (uploaded to a file sharing site) we cannot run any tests to confirm this.

[John_Ha]

For others searching 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 it or as it was when last saved with AutoRecovery. You may also find previous versions of the file in the folder it is located but which have since been deleted.