# Emergency Help Needed, If Possible, Concerning Document Recovery **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 13, 2009, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352 "2009-05-13T22:22:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/1 "2009-05-13T22:22:36Z")
I’m sitting here typing out some stuff in Microsoft Word (Word 2003, running on Visa) when Word stops working. I get the circular blue spinning mouse cursor, and the Word window did this fade-to-white thing. I need to get at all that stuff I just typed somehow. Can anyone think of any way I might be able to read off the text I’ve just typed, even though I can no longer manipulate the document from within word itself? Is there some location on disk that Word keeps an ongoing temporary file reflecting the current state of the document or something? -Kris ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/2 "2009-05-13T22:25:26Z")
Related query: When I open a .doc file attached to an email in Internet Explorer, without saving that .doc file at the same time, where does it copy the file to on the disk, if anywhere? -Kris ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/3 "2009-05-13T22:30:21Z")
The only thing I know of that will save you on the first item is if you had autosave turned on. If Vista saves things you open through IE the way XP does, it’s in your Temporary Internet Files folder, which by default is somewhere in your \Documents and Settings\username\ folder. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/4 "2009-05-13T22:38:05Z")
I just tried opening a file through my email in another instance of Word, to see where it was saving to. It’s in users\jake-kris.pc\appdata\local\microsoft\windows emporary internet files[some random sequence of letters]. But when I try to navigate to that location on the drive through Windows Explorer, there is no “temporary internet files” folder listed under the “windows” folder. And when I try to use the explorer window in Word that pops up when I hit “save as” in the second instance of Word to search around the area for the temporary file corresponding to what was open in the first (now frozen) instance, it doesn’t seem to be anywhere. Do I call time of death now or…? ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/5 "2009-05-13T22:48:45Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Related query: > > When I open a .doc file attached to an email in Internet Explorer, without saving that .doc file at the same time, where does it copy the file to on the disk, if anywhere? > > -Kris Usually in C:\Documents and Settings<username\>\Local Lettings emp You’ll need to show hidden files in order to see “Local Settings.” ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/6 "2009-05-13T22:49:10Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > But when I try to navigate to that location on the drive through Windows Explorer, there is no “temporary internet files” folder listed under the “windows” folder. Make sure you have hidden files and folders set to viewable. Don’t know how you do that in Vista, but I think the TIF folder is hidden by default. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/7 "2009-05-13T22:54:48Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > Make sure you have hidden files and folders set to viewable. Don’t know how you do that in Vista, but I think the TIF folder is hidden by default. Yeah, they’re viewable. ☹ ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/8 "2009-05-13T22:56:33Z")
I just unchecked “hide windows system files” (or something to that effect) and now I can see TIF. We’ll see if I can find the file I’m hoping to find… ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/9 "2009-05-13T22:58:15Z")
[del]You might be SOL, I’m afraid.[/del] Ah-hah! Maybe you’re not so SOL, then. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/10 "2009-05-13T23:00:48Z")
> [@KneadToKnow](#): > > [del]You might be SOL, I’m afraid.[/del] > > Ah-hah! Maybe you’re not so SOL, then. It didn’t seem to be there. If I’m not SOL, I will be momentarily when I give up and just start over. ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/11 "2009-05-13T23:07:14Z")
Dang. ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/12 "2009-05-13T23:14:56Z")
Good news (sort of) and (mostly) bad news. When I closed out everything and then opened up Word again, the “auto-recover” function kicked in. Good! But the file is apparently irrecoverably corrupted. The auto-recovered file freezes up Word every time, before I get a chance to copy/paste anything. Bad! -FrL- ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/13 "2009-05-13T23:22:23Z")
Found the autorecover file, renamed it to .txt, opened it, copied out the text to a new word file, and everything now seems okay. Have to reformat (everything I needed to get back consisted in a set of footnotes I was adding to someone else’s work, so inserting it back in as footnotes will be a hassle, but much more doable than going back over everything again!). There’s a little missing, but most of it’s here. Thanks for your help! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/14 "2009-05-13T23:26:40Z")
Your help came entirely from above, **Frylock**! Congratulations on your good fortune! ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2009, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/emergency-help-needed-if-possible-concerning-document-recovery/496352/15 "2009-05-13T23:41:52Z")
Now you get to contribute to this thread: [I need computer horror stories - In My Humble Opinion - Straight Dope Message Board](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=517382) 😃