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sarahlmackay's avatar
sarahlmackay
New member | Level 2
7 years ago

Missing recent updates to a Word file

I have a word document, saved in dropbox, that I made changes to on Friday 31st August (a lot of changes!) and this version of the file has not saved. I did change the name of the file too on that day, which is an amend I can see in the version history. I can't see any record in the version history of any edits being made on Friday 31st.

Can someone help me retrieve the most recent version of the file?

Restore
  • Jay's avatar
    Jay
    7 years ago
    If there’s no edits to the file, then it means that the file wasn’t ‘saved’ at all during.
     
    Editing a file is fine, but it doesn’t automatically update to Dropbox unless you save the file itself using Word. Once the file is updated, then the sync begins.
     
    Another possibility is that the file was copied to a place outside the Dropbox folder, edited normally (while obviously not syncing), and then moved or copied back into the Dropbox folder. 
     
    This would overwrite the older file existing there, resulting is a single edit. Afterwards you then renamed the file.
     
  • Jay's avatar
    Jay
    Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
    7 years ago
    Hi Sarah, were you amending the file using Office Online, or by opening the Word program on your machine itself?
     
    If the latter, it sounds like the Dropbox desktop application wasn’t running when making the changes. What machine were you editing the file on?
     
    Any further info you can provide would be great!
    • sarahlmackay's avatar
      sarahlmackay
      New member | Level 2
      7 years ago

      Hi Jay,

      I'm using a MacBook Pro - and I was editing the document in Word on my computer, so on the machine itself.

      It sounds like your hypothesis is write. Is there anything I can do?

      Thanks for your help!

      • Jay's avatar
        Jay
        Icon for Dropbox Staff rankDropbox Staff
        7 years ago
        Could you check and see if the desktop app is running in the menu bar?
         
        Do the files in the Dropbox folder have green ticks next to them?

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