Local data loss: how can this be avoided

[Sam Karli]

On a brand newly started project an user lost half a day's work and I want to understand what happened.

Here is the log of the server side:

Note that

1. user seem not to have sent anything (neither during or after the worikng session: as he remembers, he did it, maybe there was an error then and Send&Receive might have failed but he might not realised that, i guess). Currently he is the only man working on this project.

2. snapshots were recovered and there was no meaningful added data (just the empty template). No surprise, as user not seem to have sent anything.

3. today (04-25) morning he received (he had the feeling he shouln't do it, but AC said that data was changed on server side)

4. he seems to have overwritten his own work with the empty server data, so after receiving he saw "lost his work"

5. his Local Data Manager showed the project "Last used" today (04-25) morning

- Is it possible to recover any of this work from any local backup? I found nothing useful, but maybe.

- Is it possible that AC didn't recommend a Send (it is configured to the default 50 step/60 minute Send reminder)

- Is there a good docs on such AC recovery questions?

Thanks in advance.

[Noemi Balogh · Accepted solution]

Based on the screenshot, two server backups were created during that 2 days, but no receive. Without seeing the full history, let's suspect that no one sent any data to the project yet, but two snapshots were created, it means that we have two versions of the project where we have the empty template + the data about existing ownerships (aka reservations). If that backup is restored for some reason, then of course, it won't have any of the data that were created locally on the client computers, as they did not send anything back to the server apart from a few ownership requests.

Now let's look at it from the client side - the person worked in Archicad for 2 days without sending any changes. I'd be surprised if they didn't realise that a send failed, because in such case there is a pop up window telling you there was an issue during Send & Receive. There might be a new bug that doesn't trigger this error and I'm not aware of it, but I don't see a huge possibility for that (as data integrity is very important for Teamwork projects and they are triggered by the smallest errors way easier compared to a solo project). Still, if you'd like to know for sure, you can collect a Support Package and share it with your technical support, and they can check in the logs if anything prevented a successful Send in the background.

The "data changed on the server side" is true - while the backup had no difference from the original template file in Archicad, the metadata was definitely different (people joined the project, started reserving elements and settings, etc. - these are all stored in a Teamwork project database file), so it was the restore what triggered the "you should receive because data on the server changed" message. 

Regarding recovery: I have only bad news for you - when the person chose to receive data, they override the local database file. It was also not triggered by an error (like a crash), but by user input (they pressed OK in Archicad to this operation), therefore it's very likely that previous recovery data was deleted as well, to make sure the data integrity is kept. 

For future reference:

• Teamwork project backups (or server backups, or BIMProjectXX backups) are triggered automatically by the BIMcloud Server and they don't require user input. It is ideal, because many times people skip or forget doing a PLN backup. However, it also means, that if no one sends any data to the project and works only locally, then the server will keep creating a backup about the same status of the project that it was in when the last Send or the actual Share happened.
• It's rule number one in modern day Teamwork to Send & Receive as frequently as possible. Teamwork 1.0 in the 90s might took hours to update, but what is available in current Archicad versions should happen really fast normally. Whenever a major contribution happens, it is worth to send changes, similarly how one would save the project in solo in a similar case.
• If you are not sure whether if you sent data to the server already or not, and get such a message from Archicad that you should receive, consider saving a PLN first and receive then. This way if you end up with an empty project, you can still copy back data from your PLN.
• We have a BIMcloud Backup Guide available on the Community, but I'm not sure if it's still 100 up-to-date. However, the 1st level backup strategy should be still valid, so you might want to check it.

Sorry for the lengthy answer, but hopefully it will be useful for you and other Community members in the future too.

[Sam Karli]

Thanks for the very much in-depth analysis, it mostly supports how i see things happened.

Some remarks:

- On 04-24 the person worked on other projects, so this is the reason no data activity there.

- "so it was the restore what triggered the "you should receive because data on the server changed" message." - I think the Receive message was before any restoring of snapshots (not important, just mentioning).

PS

- it's kind of a surprise for me that while we are having Terabytes of storage there isn't a simple time-based backup (it's not just ArchiCAD, but as far as I remember those days many years ago, AutoCAD lacked something similar, too).

- it's a bit also surprising that ArchiCAD offered a "Receive" and not a "Send&Receive" having unsent local changes.

So not everything is crystal clear. (Obviously we want to avoid such experiences in the future).

Thanks again, we'll learn much from this :thumbsup: