File won't open

Last night I started a report. This morning I opened it, added a few more pictures, adjusted some comments, saved it.

Then I went to close another window and accidentally closed HIP.

OK, no big deal.

But when I go to open the inspection, it won’t load. HIP opens it, but there is zero data. Not even a blank template.

I called tech support, and was told I must have corrupted the file by closing the program after it saved, because somehow it overwrote report with a blank inspection, and I have to start the inspection over.

Ugh.

I can’t believe there isn’t a open previous version like other (non-inspection) programs have.

Thankfully I still have some of the report on the cloud, this is just plain stupid a file can be corrupted so easily.

I guess HIP isn’t the best inspection program after all. :mad:

I have had HIP for about 5 years.

No program is crash free but I can’t remember the last time I had a problem with HIP.

Check with tech support. They are very good.

I clearly said I called tech support.

I was told it was my fault that I accidentally closed the program before it had fully saved all changes (which apparently takes many seconds, doesn’t just happen when you click on “save”), which automatically causes the file to go blank.

They attempted a restore, but all data was lost.

Of course not, but the lack of a system to prevent losing your data is dumb.

I’ve been using Protools for over 10 years. It auto saves in the background and every 5-10 minutes saves a version in a separate folder in addition to the file you’re working on. So at any point you can restore a previous version with 10 different saves points to choose from. Protools crashes all the time, but you never lose more than a few minutes of work.

When photoshop saves, it names the file “filename_edited-version_x” which can be annoying at times, but you always have your last saved in case you want to go back.

The fact that HIP doesn’t have any safety net (other than the cloud) is just stupid when other programs have had such features for years and years.

That it will write over your entire file with a blank file if you hit a wrong button is just beyond stupid.

Not that it will help your current situation, but Homegauge has an auto-save feature that can be customized to save as frequently (or infrequently) as you like.

I have mine set to auto-save every 10 minutes, and it keeps the last 10 back-up copies of the report.

Dom.

Autosave would be nice but I generally save after each tab is completed so you might consider doing that. Works for me.

It’s always user error. And hip has autosave.

HIP has an auto save feature as well as HG. It sucks to lose work and sorry you had to re right portions of the report.

Yep!

You said you reached out to tech… did you hear from Dom or Dan? Chit like this always seem to happen on a weekend or holiday when you’re double booked. :roll:

^^ That.
I hit save many times throughout writing the report

Yes there is auto save.

HIP has auto save too, and I had it on, and I had just hit save, but it does NOT keep up back up copies like other (non-inspection) programs I use do.

HG does? hummm…

See post 3

Sorry to hear you lost data Ian. That’s something that can be extremely frustrating and definitely makes me feel bad to hear. I’m just seeing this now as I spent most of the day at an ER (long story). Dan and half my team was out today as they are working the holiday on Monday (when tech support from the other software companies completely shut down) and took today off instead so things were a bit busy today for the guys in the office.

We haven’t had any HIP issues with saving in years since there was an issue with a bug in Java 6. I’m sure you’ve done more than 300 to 500 inspections with HIP in the last few years so you know how stable it is. The latest HIP 4.9 even worked around a few issues we were having on Mac’s to make it even more stable.

HIP does keep a backup copy of the data in the C:\Program Files (x86)\Home Inspector Pro\Data\Temp folder on Windows and /Documents/Home Inspector Pro/Data/Temp folder on Mac. That data will remain if HIP crashes for some reason and clears out after a normal save. If my guys tried to help you restore the data it’s possible there was something wrong with the data there as well. Windows 8 and 10 also keep backups if you have Previous Versions enabled though the backups are somewhat random. We really haven’t had a reason before to keep multiple versions of backups because unlike Photoshop which crashes almost every time I use it, HIP is pretty stable. We can definitely work saving a series of backups into the next update though.

Many inspectors install HIP directly into DropBox as well that way every time you save the file Dropbox will make a copy of it within a few minutes and you can restore any version of the saved inspection you want directly from Dropbox (great feature).

HIP’s save does take anywhere from 10 seconds to 30 or 40 depending on the speed of your computer (similar to Photoshop as well), the number of photos and videos, etc as all that has to be zipped up into a single file for you. The last few updates do tell you when when the save is starting and it does pop up a message when it is complete as well.

The fact that there was no data at all, not even your normal template more than likely means that the program was forced closed during the save, the computer was shut down during save (i.e. laptop closed, computer hibernated, etc), the drive was low on space or the blank template was accidentally saved over the inspection you were working on. HIP didn’t save a blank file over you inspection, it didn’t get to complete it’s save and therefore when you opened it, nothing was there (file was only partially saved).

I forgot to mention, if you’re not using Dropbox for auto save versioning, at least enable Mac’s Time Machine feature which will auto backup all files as well.

Have not had a single issue in many years and Dom I am sure recalls all my issues in the early days.HIP is one of the most stable software’s there is.
Any issues are usually devise problems and not HIP issues.

I am sure Ian is frustrated but it is goofy to blame his devise issues on HIP.

My personal experience is only mobile has problems at times due to cell phone inability to handle massive data input at times or bad signal strength on uploads which causes interruptions during transfers which is outside HIP control.

Desktop is 100% stable .

Yeah but I definitely understand the frustration of losing work. Luckily he had most of it on the cloud backed up. Ian’s right though that we can implement something that keeps a copy of the last 10 saves instead of just the current and previous save then it would make things even more fool proof. Even something that works great 99.9% of the time is still going to fail 1 in 1000.

Your guy didn’t even attempt that.

I didn’t close the computer, I certainly didn’t force quit the program, the file is on a 2TB hard drive I recently purchased, so it’s not low on space.

Not sure how that would work.Does that mean our files would show multiple copies of the same inspection ? I kinda would hate to see a log jam in my files as I have not had a chance to begin ISN dependency and love my Ctrl F button.

My file names are used for search and having 10 copies of the same inspection show up would suck.
The cloud or server files are not dependable for that if left as the only single copies of each report .

In other words would not want 1o files with the same name appearing in HIP data .
.