Invalid or corrupt file error

Mar 29, 2017

My co-worker has been working on a training module for several days using Storyline 2, and when he tried to open it today, he got the following message:

"The project is invalid or corrupt and cannot be opened. It may have been created in an earlier version of Storyline."

We know that he is using the same version of Storyline (same update version as well). Is there anyway to try to "fix" this issue with the file, or at least try to extract some or all of the slides out of it?

I will try to attach the file, but it is 12 MB.

Thanks in advance to anyone who could help!

- Chuck Campbell, New York Power Authority

Intro_to_ECC.story

9 Replies

Michael Shannon

7 years ago03/29/17 at 7:23 pm (UTC)

Hey Chuck, I get the same error. Not sure why that may have happened. You may have more help from one of the Articulate staff.

Chuck Campbell
Author

7 years ago03/29/17 at 7:37 pm (UTC)

Thanks, Michael.

Our only option that we had was to "right click" on the *.story file and select "restore previous versions." Luckily, my co-worker actually had a previous versions from a Windows Backup to restore from just a few days ago, so he only had to redo a couple of slides.

Leslie McKerchie
Staff

7 years ago03/29/17 at 7:53 pm (UTC)

Well that's certainly good news Chuck.

For future reference or for others that may run across this thread, there may still be a working version of your project in your temp files when this happens. Here's how to check:

1) Open this folder in Windows Explorer: %appdata%\Articulate\Storyline

2) Scan the contents of this folder for a file that starts with the name of your project. If you find one, copy it to your desktop. If you find more than one, copy the latest version to your desktop.

3) Change the file extension of the copy on your desktop from *.tmp to *.story.

4) Double-click the file to open it in Storyline.

File corruption is unpredictable, and there's no straightforward way to determine what causes it. Common causes are environmental (disk errors, power outages, improper shutdowns), viruses, failed Windows updates, and even file size (i.e., very large files have a higher risk of corrupting). Consider using the preventative measures described in this article to protect your project files.

Leslie McKerchie
Staff

7 years ago03/29/17 at 7:54 pm (UTC)

It also sounds like you may be working collaboratively, so I'll share this:

When working on an Articulate Storyline 2 project in a collaborative environment with other developers, use this workflow to avoid loss of resources, file corruption, and other erratic behavior that can occur due to network latency.

7 years ago03/30/17 at 1:39 am (UTC)

Leslie,

Thanks so much for the advice and feedback. I will have him check the temp files tomorrow.

My assumption is that he performed an improper shutdown, based on my questioning of what led up to the corrupted file. The file size is much smaller than files I have worked on in the past (with no issues).

As far as the "workflow" process you recommend, we have been doing that all along. We work on the local drive, copy to the network drive for backups, and only publish to local drives.

Thanks again for your help and recommendations!

- Chuck