This can't be happening!

I still have a published version of the project where it is supposed to be. Can I somehow revert that back to an editable project?

Hi Fraser!

You cannot get a project file out of the published content. 

Hi Fraser

unfortunately you can't get your .source file from the published content.

However,

There may still be a working version of your project in your temp files. 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.

Hi Leslie:

File corruption is an occasional event that plagues my organization.  It is tricky to deal with because crashing during editing is very troublesome.

Also, which prior project version do you go back to, to ensure that the corruption has been dealt with?  This is a very challenging question to answer.

The way we pro-actively attempt to MITIGATE/PREVENT this it is very similar to what you suggest in the article - we even go so far as to "highly incrementalize" versions of the SAME project, so that if a major corruption occurs, we have multiple save points and flexibility to return to.

Typical symptoms of a corrupted project include the inability to Publish, or when you make an edit to a complex or detailed Slide element (or, at times, ANY Slide Element), it crashes SL2.

If this happens, if possible, CLOSE THE PROJECT IMMEDIATELY, but DON'T SAVE.  In most cases you can usually bring in the most recent changes and content from this file into another.

The primary trick I use to rescue corrupted files, ironically involves the Import Step:

1. Create a NEW, BLANK Storyline 2 Project, and SAVE it under a NEW, somewhat DIFFERENT FILENAME than one you have used previously.

2. Using the File Tab, IMPORT the Project Slides from your corrupted SL2 Project.

3. Save under a NEW FILENAME, and then Publish the new Project to ensure that things are working as expected. 

As a general rule, Publishing is a good baseline for checking general levels of corruption, at least, it seems to work pretty well for me so far. ;)

-------------------------

Hope this helps!

-Mark

That sounds like a terrible plague to have Mark, but I do appreciate you popping in to share with the community.

It is an occasional plague, Leslie  ;)

Thankfully, it has not been much of an issue for us recently, but we have learned to not take too many things for granted since getting burned a few months ago by this.

I've run into similar kinds of corruption issues within Microsoft Office VBA, particularly Excel and Access, and attempted to use a comparable solution to work-around Storyline 2's issue in this case.

Thankfully, this strategy worked for me on the first try.

Perhaps in Storyline 3 this will be less of an issue. ;)

Hello everyone, thank you for your responses. I just had to knuckle down and redo the work unfortunately. Now I save every hour and up load to Google Drive after every save.

Thanks for stopping in to share an update, Fraser, and saving frequently is always a great idea! :)

I thought I might also pass along this article in case you'd like to check it out: Follow These Tips to Reduce Your Risk of Corrupting or Losing Project Files.