Data loss after file recovery unnoticed interruption

Help
1

What I’m trying to do

i experienced two days ago a data-loss in a file i was editing on Obsidian. while editing the application behaved normally, so i was able to edit in a normal way. then i wanted to open another file so i noticed that it wasn’t possible. all menus in the application were frozen. but strangely i was able to edit. i had to force quit the application, and after reopening i noticed that my file was not the updated, it was the version of one and a half days ago. i noticed that file recovery showed a gap in the snapshot. my activities during the last one and a half day earlier were not captured. so i lost basically that amount of work.

the only event which i can think of to be related to this issue is that i erased a folder in the vault from Finder, while Obsidian is running. Obsidian didn’t show the folder as expected, and i was working as usual. only after the crash i suspect that maybe removing the folder from outside Obsidian was not a good idea.

Things I have tried

i tried File Recovery as mentioned but it kind of stopped capturing my edits for one day and a half, as it seems.

i am running Obsidian 1.7.4 on macOS 14.6.1 macbook air M1.
my files are stored locally on the hard desk.
i didn’t edit my notes in other application than Obsidian

i ended up accepting the data loss and reediting my file. i am just worried that it could happen again, and i lose more data.

Screenshot 2024-10-30 at 09.27.30
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Screenshot 2024-10-30 at 09.57.44
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2

Thanks.

There’s one thing that I don’t understand. Did you notice that Obsidian was in a weird state and your kept editing that file for one a half day?

Were you able to edit other files during that time frame? are those files saved? how does the file history of those files looks like?

3

thanks.
no, i didn’t notice any irregularity on Obsidian before the described crash. but i also don’t do more than editing and writing on the application. so maybe Obsidian was already in a weird mode and i didn’t notice because i was just working on one file.
i checked, i did work on another file during the lost day and a half, and the File Recovery looks like this:
Screenshot 2024-10-30 at 16.52.14

i also lost my edits from the day before for that second file

4

That’s what I was thinking.

It is strange though that obsidian is not working properly and you are able to work on multiple notes without noticing.

Please do let us know if it happens again.
Also can you paste here the output of the command “debug info”, thanks.

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5

Do you think it might be synced with your mobile? check if you can recover from there. Also, when was the last timemachine backup?

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6

thanks.
unfortunately i don’t use sync service with my mobile.
but the good news is that i didn’t experience any irregularities or data loss since this incident.
Obsidian is very stable all the time.
my guess remains that erasing Vault’s data from Finder, not from Obsidian, kind of confused Obsidian and disturbed its file recovery mechanism.
best

7

Yea… because it relies heavily on its file indexing mechanism, making changes outside the app can occasionally disrupt its synchronization process. I’m glad everything’s back to normal now!

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