[Solved] Files not in Recent Documents after Windows update

[melanieD]

I am having similar trouble. I have used OpenOffice for many years. Today everything is gone! My computer updated Friday and had to do the restart. Can I recover my files? Thanks!

Edit: Changed subject, was File disappeared after update  Make your post understandable by others  -- MrProgrammer, forum moderator

[FJCC]

When you say your files are gone, do you mean that they are no longer in the folder where they were stored or that they are gone from the Recent Documents list? Please explain how you have looked for them.

[melanieD]

I clicked on text document. Open folder. All missing except what I had done Nov 29.
Computer restarted Friday. Have not turned it on since.
Never had any problems before. Love OpenOffice until now.
Thanks.

[FJCC]

Since you are on Windows 10, try this. Open your Documents folder. At the upper right there is a search box. It is marked with an icon of a magnifying glass. Type the file extension of the kind of documents you are looking for and press Enter. If you made them in Writer, the file extension is probably .odt. This will bring up a list of all the .odt files in the Documents folder. Do you see your missing documents among them?
You can see the box with odt written in it in the attached picture.

SearchBox.JPG (27.98 KiB) Viewed 2317 times

[melanieD]

Thanks so much. Will try that tomorrow. Will just always wonder what happened. Will post my results...Hopefully successful!

[Hagar Delest]

I clicked on text document. Open folder. All missing except what I had done Nov 29.

I don't understand.
Either you are in the folder (with your file browser) and you do see the document and when you click it it should open, or you open AOO first and then you navigate to the folder where your files are.

If you use the AOO recent documents list, what happens?

[melanieD]

Thankfully FJCC had the solution so I could find all the missing files/documents. I did the search for .odt and also .pdf. They showed up and I was able to retrieve what I desperately needed for today! I appreciate your help so very much!

Is there some way to get them back in my OpenOffice so they are easily found? I had always used the "recent," etc. folders to find everything. "Recent" just was empty except what I did yesterday experimenting.

[Hagar Delest]

First check where those files are located.
Make sure that they are in a correct folder, like 'My documents'. Then open them from the Explorer and they will populate the AOO recent documents list.

[melanieD]

Thank you! Y'all have been so helpful. Will try that soon.