Apparently this is an issue, but I don’t see a solution for my situation.
I opened Scrivener 3.1.3 on my Mac. When I did that some box/message popped up on my screen (not on Scrivener) about some file (turns out it was binder.scrivproj). I just closed it or deleted it. Now it’s nowhere.
I had two projects opened and then I tried to open another one and got a box pop up (see attachment). I tried what is suggested and see nothing.
I was opening the file from where it was saved on my Desktop. Then I tried where I have it saved on an External Drive. Then I tried where I have it saved on Google Drive. Nothing opened. I thought maybe when I deleted it that Google Drive deleted it too, but I didn’t see the file in Google Drive “trash”…you can restore deleted items on your desktop that were deleted in Google Drive. Not sure how that works, but it does.
The file/projecte was last opened in April 19th, 2018.
I always update when it asks to update.
Any ideas? Can I simply get that file sent to me and then install/add it to the appropriate Scrivener file location on my computer?
Scrivener has a backup function and unless you have turned that off you should have several backup copies of the project that would date back to the time when you last successfully used that project. I would go duplicate those backup files and put them move them to a folder someplace where you can then try opening the latest of them to see what you’ve got.
The location of your Scriv backup folder can be found from Scriv > Preferences > Backup.
Thank you. It wasn’t in there, whereas others were. But it made me think of searching for the file (not sure why I didn’t think of that before) and I found it. Thankfully, I had my files saved in numerous locations.
This doesn’t handle my problem, though. I can open my file on my old computer running my old Scrivener. What doesn’t work is that file in the new Scrivener. I get that same message as the OP
I’ve checked and the old software definitely opens that file. Also, there is no file by the name binder.scrivproj on my old computer and yet it’s fine.
On the system that works, please create a ZIP backup of the project file. (File -> Backup -> Backup To)
Transfer that backup to the system that doesn’t work by any convenient method.
UnZIP the file, and attempt to open the project.
If that doesn’t work, please use the Scrivener -> About Scrivener command to confirm what versions of Scrivener are running on the two systems.
The binder.scrivproj file message is a red herring, as neither the Scrivener 2 nor the Scrivener 3 project format requires one. In this context, it’s a more general indication that Scrivener is missing some of the important component files in the project.
Then the problem lies with whatever method you had previously used to transfer the file.
A Scrivener project is a folder, with subfolders and potentially hundreds of component files. An error message like this one usually indicates that the master index file used to build the Binder is missing.
