I appreciate everyone’s help. I still don’t quite understand, but I am sure I will get there sooner or later.
For the record: I turned OFF “open last project” because it seems like a small thing to have to select which file to open each time, and I don’t want it to ever open up an older copy of the file first.
That’s counterintuitive.
You’ve been advised how to handle backups, yet your workflow depends on File Saves As and now you want to turn off your ability to open your last worked on (SAVED) file.
Aside from backups and their ability as a SECONDARY saving measure, rest assured that prior to those backups, Scrivener SAVES. Leave your saves alone. Leave opening last saved file automatically as is. Making this process manual is exposing yourself to the risk of introducing human error, which is likely the cause of your initial query.
Have to say I disagree completely. I have, and always have had, “Open last project/profile” turned off in every application. If you use clear file/project naming and organised folder structure on your disks, human error is minimised.
I wouldn’t be surprised if a major portion of “I’ve lost text” and similar posts are the result of a combination of using “Save As”, “Open last project” and relying on “Recent projects” rather than using a clear naming system and knowing where you have saved projects/files in the file system.
Mark
‘Save As’ is the common denominator in many of the ‘lost text’ IMHO
Alright, perhaps it works better for me because I don’t have 101 little projects.
The other day I opened a project from a jump list and noted two with the same name. Hovering over one of them to show the full path revealed that one was renamed -OLD (the correct name) but the jump list name hadn’t updated. Had I continued, the open would have failed anyway because I delete old things as soon as they’ve served their purpose.
Yes.
Synchronization issues – and particularly “smart” syncing – are the number one cause by a wide margin. “Save As” and other “wrong project” issues are second.
There isn’t really a third. True data loss from Scrivener projects is extremely rare.