Autosave not on by default? Dumb or what?

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If I’m not mistaken, previous RW versions had autosave on by default. At least I was aware that any changes were automatically saved in case I quit RW, or lost power, or some other event caused the project to close, with or without reviewing changes.

Silly me, I assumed RW7 would intelligently behave the same way, so after spending hours on a page over the course of a couple of days, then quitting RW (for some reason or another-I don’t remember what action I took on the review changes window, or if I saw one - I went to work on it again and ALL new work is gone. I then inspected preferences and see that there is an option to always autosave which is NOT checked. Who in their right mind wouldn’t want that on by default?

I’ve lost hours of work and have to (very carefully) check each and every page to see what other little details are missing. PITA is not strong enough to describe what I am saying right now.

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I switched off autosave in 6 already as I’m running a different system whereby I constantly save when I think I’ve applied changes that make it worthwhile. The reasons: There are apps that do autosave and some are not. I don’t want to become easy about data integrity and rather do the manual thing.
Then, I regularly create datestamped versions as shown here:

Then, I run TimeMachine that creates a shapshot of my (saved!) file every hour and I also run a regular CarbonCopy-Clone in case I need to startup from an external HD. Adding to my paranoja: I’m running encrypted AWS-backups constantly.

My recommendation to you would be:

  1. Develop a contingency routine whereby you save your file manually after you’ve applied changes
  2. Make sure that your TM is running

Worst case, I’m loosing 1 hour…
I know that this is too late for you now… Sorry…

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For many apps out there like Notes, TextEdit etc. Autosave is just fine. But for productivity apps like RapidWeaver it is – at least in my opinion – the worst thing ever! I quote myself from a post I made here in August, 2015…

“My advice: turn this feature OFF, since it’s absolute nonsense in my opinion, even dangerous. In an environment like RapidWeaver this “feature” really is the worst what can happen to you. You can destroy your precious projects with this sooner than you notice it. Example: Open your project because you have an idea to improve s.th. on your site. Then change some things as you thought it would be nice (maybe you even have deleted one or more pages for this). Realize that it wasn’t such a good idea and close the project. Boom: project destroyed, since the version you just did close was automatically saved. Yes, you can get it back somehow, but this whole thing is completely counterproductive in a web-development in my opinion and should be turned off by default when installing RapidWeaver (maybe it is already, I don’t know). Just my 2 cents…”

Or another example: I’m working on one of my many client projects and need a complicate stack-combination which I’ve luckily already used in another project. So I open the other project additionally and accidentally cut this stack instead of copying it and then just close this project. Boom, trouble is on its way. Because when I open that other project after some time again to make some adjustments I won’t remember that there has accidentally been s.th. changed some time ago. I will notice that after publishing when the client calls me asking why things are broken…

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Well you guys make good points for having it off, I admit. It could work both ways I suppose, but JSC has a nice strategy with the time stamped idea. Since I have Time Machine that does run every hour that could be a good strategy to follow. Do you do this by duplicating the project for the different saved versions, then relying on TM? Is that what you mean by “create datestamped versions”?

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Hi @Jody,

  1. I save when I feel like I’ve done enough things that do what they’re supposed to do and deserve saving. (Painlevel: How much efforts to do it again?) Manual process. It’s the Command-“s” thing I’m used since my first Mac 1984. TimeMachine will catch what’s been saved every hour by default. So, I’ll have some generations here to roll back if required.
  2. Every morning, before I start RW, I duplicate the project I want to work on and add the daystamp such as “_160615”. Sorting order is then year, month, day… This leaves me with the original file to continue working with.

All my other backup strategies are just because I’m paranoid… No, seriously, I’ve seen it all during my time in IT and don’t want to suffer from data loss.
Cheers!

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The “Command Save” option is also my preferred strategy… only there is a BUG (yes I said it), in RW7 whereby after a few saves I get the “Document could not be saved” window. This is a known issue and posted on the forum (by me and others). Solution is to duplicate the project, trash the “not saved” one, rename it and keep going.

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I’m a fan of Autosave everywhere, but definitively not on RW, for smaller projects it works just fine, the issue comes when you try to return to a later version of a big file, it won’t work, it will either crash or it will take eons to build every thumbnail, so I would not recommend to use autosave on RW.

BUT I would absolutely not recommend under any circumstances to leave the saving, backup and versioning processes to yourself, thats what computers are for!

There is a solution, see even Apple itself uses a different approach in regards to big projects, take Final Cut Pro as an example, it has a thing called Library Backups that is essentially a tailored solution for FCP. So how to apply this on RW? I use a very powerful macros app called Keyboard Maestro, its like Automator but with steroids, anyways, I’ve set a workflow that monitors if RW is open and it will hit “Cmd S” every 5 minutes, usually I just let TimeMachine to take care of the versions, it won’t be a version per save as with autosave, but something like every hour or so, and if you want to force a new version, just click on “Back up now” on TimeMachine’s dropdown menu.

Now that RW supports Dropbox, if you have Pro, there are versions too, haven’t tried that workflow yet but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work.

Also you should try Backblaze, which will automatically save to the cloud much like TimeMachine but offsite, because redundancy is what makes a backup strategy real.

In the podcast they mentioned GIT (Tower app rules BTW) which use every day, but only for code, I don’t like it for RW, and its not automatic either.

Hope it helps :wink:

( Hey @dan @bon is there a way to improve autosave for big projects? )

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I have always relied on Autosave and as far as I was concerned it was always on by default as I can’t find a way of turning it on or off in preferences. I have just had another RW crash and all my last 3 hours work has dissappeared. Yes I have Time Machine but for some reason it won’t restore the previous versions of my project file today!!.. (It will from yesterday backward) So whats going on Radpidweaver?
I am really considering what others have suggested to make sure you save your work as you go but I am so used to using autosave features that its going to be hard to remember. Bloody Rapidweaver I’m really hacked off!.. rant over!

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To each their own. I do not like auto save and would never use it. Option, yes, but not default. Consider saving is a suggestion? What does it take? Command s takes a second. No different than using any other program.

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Can you find a toggle on/off switch for autosave?. I’ve looked everywhere and can’t seem to find it. I have the latest version of RW & OSX Sierra installed.

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I believe it was removed. Google https://www.google.com/search?source=hp&q=autosave+rapidweaver+7&oq=autosave+rapidweaver+7&gs_l=psy-ab.3...1057.5758.0.5910.23.22.0.0.0.0.118.1946.17j5.22.0…0…1.1.64.psy-ab…1.21.1831.0…0j35i39k1j0i131k1j0i20k1j0i20i46k1j46i20k1j0i22i30k1j0i8i13i30k1.NG6Gmrvna9c

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Thanks Lisa @LSPhoto it may well be its gone now, My main worry was that there was some sort of autosave going on, certainly yesterday and before and that it seemed to mess up my OSX Time Machine today at the same time. Anyway I’ve got Time Machine back running as it should now and I’m learning to ‘cmd-s’ now so all should be well by tomorrow. :slight_smile:

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I’m a looooong time Mac user, so I command s in my sleep. Actually, I command Z in my mind when I accidentally turn a shirt inside out that was right side to begin with when folding laundry :wink:

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I went through a couple of replacement 1st / 2nd generation Time Capsules that I would say were “total junk”. Not cheap. One of the worst pieces of hardware Apple ever produced IMO. Various problems with overheating, weak WiFi connectivity or the firmware randomly locking-up on them. Others have had better luck with them - especially the newer ones - but it isn’t a product I went back to.

After I moved my TM backups onto a little USB bus-powered Samsung drive, everything has been working flawlessly for several years. TM doesn’t give me any problems or aggravation. Every backup works. Never lost anything.

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Yes Steve. I’ve relied on Time Machine for years with both Time Capsule and external HD. Always worked flawlessly for me.

Jody

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Don’t know about that.
I have time machine running and have used it quite a bit to restore individual files, and even have restored a complete Mac with it and never had a problem.

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