# How do I access this text file? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 13, 2021, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037 "2021-05-13T20:26:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/41 "2021-05-15T03:40:16Z")
No problem, but you might be overestimating the complication. Just visit this site (it’s a fully online editor, no need to install anything) and load up your file: > **[HexEd.it - Browser-based Online and Offline Hex Editing](https://hexed.it/)** > > HexEd.it is a free hex editor for Windows, MacOS, Linux and all other modern operating systems, which uses HTML5 and JavaScript (JS) technology to enable hexediting online, directly in your browser. It should be very obvious if there’s anything there or not. Just scroll through the file and see if you recognize any of the original text. If not, it’ll likely show up as a bunch of some junk character. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/42 "2021-05-15T05:24:33Z")
Wow, this editor war discussion makes me feel 30 years younger. I agree with the hex editor suggestion. I suspect the printer is just ejecting pages it can make no sense of. And if the hex editor shows that most of the content is there, it can be reclaimed, even if painfully. I’ve done it myself. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/43 "2021-05-15T19:51:35Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Ln 1, Col 1 | 100% | Windows (CRLF) | UTF-8 > > If I use the Select All command and highlight everything, I get: > > Ln 1, Col 23998 | 100% | Windows (CRLF) | UTF-8 There is a large clue right here in plain sight. At the risk of insulting folks with something real basic … Regardless of what you think the file contains, or what shape the contents are, Notepad thinks it is one line tall and 24000 characters wide. Which means that you pushing the up or down arrow, or page up and page down buttons do nothing since the file is just one line tall. To see the contents (if any exist) you need to scroll to the right. Perhaps a _very_ long way to the right. You might also try selecting the Format \>\> Word Wrap feature from the menu and see whether suddenly you’ve got a lot of visible text below a blank area at the top. With the Word Wrap on (checkmark visible on the menu item), if you still see nothing then I’d be very inclined to say the file has been destroyed somehow. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/44 "2021-05-15T20:20:23Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Regardless of what you think the file contains, or what shape the contents are, Notepad thinks it is one line tall and 24000 characters wide. This sounds like the kind of file a cat might produce. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/45 "2021-05-15T20:33:58Z")
Or a pet snake. They prefer long and thin. Funny, you’d think cats would produce shorter than average lines becasue the enter key is larger than most and should be hit at random proportionally more often. Then again not knowing which spots on the keyboard are any given cat’s preferred home row and home keys, we can’t say too much. Perhaps a bit of spilled food makes @Little_Nemo’s tab key and spacebar smell especially interesting. Still, this may well be a PEBKAC error\* but in this case the C stands for Cat. 😉 * * * \* > **[User error | Acronyms and other names](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_error#Acronyms_and_other_names)** > > Terms like PEBMAC/PEBCAK or an ID10T error are often used by tech support operators and computer experts to describe a user error as a problem that is attributed to the user's ignorance instead of a software or hardware malfunction. These phrases are used as a humorous way to describe user errors. A highly popularized example of this is a user mistaking their CD-ROM tray for a cup holder, or a user looking for the "any key". However, any variety of stupidity or ignorance-induced problems can ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2021, 9:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/46 "2021-05-15T21:17:35Z")
It’s easy to get a lot of white space in a Notepad doc just by letting a book or something lean on the space or tab key. No need for pet interference. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/47 "2021-05-17T02:26:22Z")
I tried the HexEd.it site and it showed me this file is full of nothing but zeroes. I think what we have here is a dead file. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 2:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/48 "2021-05-17T02:29:09Z")
Certainly seems to be. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/49 "2021-05-17T02:35:10Z")
Did CHKDSK report any (further) corruption, or was that file the only victim? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/50 "2021-05-17T05:25:44Z")
I would say you saved an entire file of whitespace somehow, or a file got corrupted to be entirely whitespace. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 5:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/51 "2021-05-17T05:40:27Z")
Zeros are not normal whitespace, though. You would have to work a bit to type a bunch of zeros into a text editor and not notice. [It’s easy with vim: 20000i control-q control-@ escape gets you 20000 zeros. But you still would not type that in by accident, nor have we erased anything that was already there…] ---
**Author:** ![Max\_S](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@Max\_S](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_S)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2021, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/52 "2021-05-17T23:48:27Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I tried the HexEd.it site and it showed me this file is full of nothing but zeroes. This may be a side effect of sudden power loss on NTFS-formatted storage with write-caching enabled. Write-caching “Improves system performance[…], but a power outage or equipment failure might result in data loss or corruption.” If you are using a modern Windows system there is a very high chance that your storage is NTFS-formatted with write-caching enabled. ~Max ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/53 "2021-05-18T04:00:23Z")
In Linux or other Unix-heritage operating systems with a standard userland toolset, it’s as easy as `mkfile 20k .txt`. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/54 "2021-05-18T04:14:59Z")
I personally have had a file truncated to zero length after a power failure, but can’t recall having the contents replaced by nulls. Now I’m wondering if a block-by-block scan of the OP’s disk might recover any of the original contents… ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2021, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037/55 "2021-05-18T16:34:14Z")
@Max_S: HDDs can do that on their own even if Windows is set to not write-cache. HDD firmware is infamous for lying to Window’s attempts to confirm that no kidding the data is really really saved, not just cached somewhere in the drive’s own volatile storage. Why lie to the OS? For better advertised performance. I’m not up to date enough on SSD firmware to say whether they pull the same crap. If forced to bet, I’d bet “Yes”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-access-this-text-file/942037.md?page=2)