Visual Studio lost my solution

[Fred Nerd]

OK, so I'm smoking mad...
Was almost finished Assignment 8 of Programming School in C#
Had the project open in Visual Studio, and remembered to hit CTRL +S after everything that worked. System had some form of crash (I only ever hibernate, so its not too suprising) and now its GONE.
Shadow Explorer can't even find it.
This is Vista, does anyone have any idea of how it might be recovered?
Serves me right for not having a full backup plan, BUT I often haven't the time for the laptop, and I only back up important docs/photos.
Gnnnn Gnnnn Gnnnn, this is sooo annoying. And I was so close.

[Ath]

Try a chkdsk like operation, and check out the files it produces (in the root of the drive or in dir00001 style directories), sometimes you can find pieces of sourcecode there.

[Fred Nerd]

I ran ChkDSK, but the log tells me nothing. You mean a recovery program, or where do I find the files? Thanks for help.

[Fred Nerd]

Also, Mouser, if I submit it without fully re-creating everything, I hope you remember this post.

[phitsc]

It's of course no help now, but: start using a version control system.

There are free hosting services that allow closed source projects, if you'd rather keep your stuff private.

[Ath]

check out the files it produces (in the root of the drive or in dir00001 style directories)

-Ath (May 16, 2011, 06:07 AM)

where do I find the files?

-Fred Nerd (May 16, 2011, 06:42 AM)

[kyrathaba]

I had a similar, though less catastrophic, experience with MS Visual C# 2010 Express a few days ago: for some reason, it simply dropped the entire menu system I'd built for my WinForms app.  Now, it's possible (perhaps more likely) that I somehow accidentally struck a key-combo and unwittingly did this; still, disconcerting.

You might try Recuva or Paretologic's file recovery utilities.  I think there are free versions of both.

I use Beanstalk's SVN hosting, in conjunction with freeware Tortoise SVN.  Currently, Beanstalk is free for hosting a single solution at a time, up to fairly good-size medium projects (certainly it could easily handle any Programming School assignments, with tons of room to spare).

[Ath]

For a SVN server solution, the free version of VisualSVN would do nicely if you have a local PC running some kind of Windows NT based OS (XP and up would suffice), and is probably a lot faster too. Not necessarily safer though.

[cranioscopical]

Had the project open in Visual Studio, and remembered to hit CTRL +S after everything that worked. System had some form of crash (I only ever hibernate, so its not too suprising) and now its GONE.

-Fred Nerd (May 16, 2011, 05:54 AM)

Sorry to learn of your frustration, I hope that you can reconstruct what you had or use your memory of it to create something even better.

That said, you do have now one of the better "the dog ate my homework" stories to bandy about.  

[kyrathaba]

Did you have the "create backup" option set?  If so, check for a /backup/ subdirectory in your projects directory, and see if you get lucky.

[phitsc]

You can find quite a nifty subversion hosting comparison here:

http://www.svnhostingcomparison.com/

Filter for 'Free only' and 'OSS Only: No'.

[Fred Nerd]

Thanks for your support, but I think its gone now.
Even with Shadow Explorer I can only find an empty folder with the right name in backup.
I'd never heard of SVN before. Looks way overkill for this, but I'll try it just to learn it.
I'll do it again, but there's just so much 'fill' work which seems a waste of precious time since its only an assignment.

Anyway, as advice to anyone new to VS, I found out later there is a setting in options to save upon creation which should have avoided this if I'd known this before.

[kyrathaba]

I'd never heard of SVN before. Looks way overkill for this, but I'll try it just to learn it.
I'll do it again, but there's just so much 'fill' work which seems a waste of precious time since its only an assignment.

I figured SVN out; so I KNOW you can

I've had to re-start a ProgSchool assignment before; very irritating.  One thing I noted though was that my second go at it was easier, as I had the benefit of what I'd already learned.  And, often on the re-coding, you'll do a better, more concise job.

[phitsc]

...
I'd never heard of SVN before. Looks way overkill for this, but I'll try it just to learn it.
...

-Fred Nerd (May 16, 2011, 04:05 PM)

As soon as something takes you more than a day to program, I'd say it's not overkill any more. And it's actually very easy to use too. Install TortoiseSVN, read a short tutorial that teaches you the very basics, and you're good to go. You'll soon understand the benefits that a VCS gives you over mere backups of your code.

I'd even say everyone needs to take a Subversion (or other VCS) assignment before he's allowed to take on any other programming assignment

[ewemoa]

If version control system selection is on the horizon, may be some of the following discussion will be of some interest:

https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=25765.0

[phitsc]

Hey ewemoa, approaching your thousand's post!