I updated Storyline due to the latest release. I then attempted to open a file I had been working on just previous to this release and now I receive the error message - "This project is invalid or corrupt and cannot be opened. It may have been created in an earlier version of Storyline."
Please let me know if there is a fix here, I'm under a time constraint and don't need this headache with this course.
Our problem was fixed a long time ago by deleting a font we had gotten on
google fonts. Apparently SL didn't like that font. When we got rid of
it-everything saved fine. It was Oswald in our case but it may be a font
that is corrupted, look in your fonts and see if you have any that you may
be using that are corrupt. That's all I know-hope this helps.
Unfortunately, once a .STORY file becomes unusable, it's no longer recoverable.
When creating, editing, or publishing a Storyline project, we recommend working from your local hard drive (typically your C: drive). Working from a network drive or a USB drive can cause erratic behavior, such as file corruption, an inability to save changes you've made to your project, and loss of resources.
Just had this corrupted file thing happen to me with a file created on a trial version then corrupted after I put in the licence number. I was devastated that I had lost a weeks worth of work! Muhammad - thanks so much for the suggestion! You saved my project!!!
I'm having the same issue after getting a new computer and copying all my files to the new computer. Nothing mentioned earlier in any of the strings works. Thank you for the help.
The motherboard fried on the other computer and I was able to salvage the hard drive and transfer the information to the new computer. All the files seem to work from the hard drive except the Articulate files so it almost seems like they needed something from the old computer for them to work.
Thanks for testing it out. I had a really good tech try and figure it out to no avail. A have the published file on a drive and it works great. Too bad it can't be unpublished.
I have a course which I had created in Storyline 2, so for me there is no migration issue from SL1 to 2. But I still get similar error that the file is corrupt and so on. And I asked my company IT guy to do whatever possible to recover that 1 hr long e-learning module which was supposed to be updated on our LMS the earliest. Now, it's certainly a pain to redo everything from scratch.
I believe this bug needs to be resolved the earliest. Or going by the old formula which is certainly relevant - to keep multiple copies of the file at different location before we update anything in the original. :(
I'm sorry to hear you ran into a corruption issue with your .story file.
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.
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 these preventative measures to protect your project files:
1) Save and publish projects on your local hard drive. Working on a network drive or external USB drive can cause erratic behavior.
2) Save incrementally. If your app has an AutoRecovery feature, take advantage of it. If not, save a new version of your project every hour or so with a new file name each time. If a file becomes corrupt, you'll still have a working version available.
3) Install Dropbox. Snapshots of changes in your local Dropbox folder are kept for 30 days. If a file is damaged or deleted, you can restore a previous snapshot: https://www.dropbox.com/help/11/en.
4) Don't leave the app open and unattended for long periods of time. Some users have reported file corruption after leaving their apps open overnight. It's possible that a malware scan or disk backup could run because the machine is idle, making your app vulnerable to crashing.
I'm sorry to hear that - it's not a guarantee that they're located there, but I know it's worked for a lot of users so it is definitely worth checking. Please let us know if you need anything else.
Sorry If I'm posting the question on old thread. Googled and landed on this page.
I'm working on Articulate Stroyline 2.0 and got this error message "This project is invalid or corrupt and cannot be opened. It may have been created in an earlier version of Storyline.
All my project is ready and suddenly the file got corrupted is there any auto-saved available and please guide me how to get back my project.
Please reply me.. Waiting for your help.... !
Thanks, Sri Harsha Kotamarthy (Technical Writer, India)
No apologies necessary - you're welcome to pop into old threads. If you're using Storyline 2 you may want to try the steps here to follow and see if there is another copy of your file in the temp folders:
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.
Additionally you could look at importing the existing file into a new project file as described here. Sometimes I find that is effective when receiving odd error messages or opening an instance of Storyline first and then trying to open the file from within there.
Glad to hear that you were able to recover your file Sri!
Unless we get down to the bottom of what caused your corruption, it would be difficult to say what the long-term solution would be.
I would advise that if you run into any difficulty again that you work directly with our support team so that we can try to identify the root cause of the issue.
At the same time, I'm sure we all hope it does not happen again to warrant this need.
i have just had the same experience and while it is nice to have a community try to find work-arounds, this is an issue and needs to be fixed. Comments from staff such as "I'm sure we all hope it doesn't happen again" are not good enough - unless the bug is identified and fixed, it will happen again. I'm sure you won't be putting the warning "Please note, projects are prone to corruption at any stage and may be unrecoverable" on the purchase page or that Storyline 2 is unstable. My 3 day project is now unrecoverable and has to be rebuilt.
I'm sorry you've run into this issue and error message. I know that our team has continued to investigate things such as this, but since the way in which users see that message has not been consistent it's difficult to have pinpointed the particular issue needed to be fixed. If you'd like to connect with our team and share your .story file as a sample and the steps you went through just before the error message that would be helpful in tracking down the root cause of such. You can send the file along privately here to our team.
137 Replies
Our problem was fixed a long time ago by deleting a font we had gotten on
google fonts. Apparently SL didn't like that font. When we got rid of
it-everything saved fine. It was Oswald in our case but it may be a font
that is corrupted, look in your fonts and see if you have any that you may
be using that are corrupt. That's all I know-hope this helps.
Thanks for sharing Jeff :)
Prardhana - I cannot access or import your file.
Unfortunately, once a .STORY file becomes unusable, it's no longer recoverable.
When creating, editing, or publishing a Storyline project, we recommend working from your local hard drive (typically your C: drive). Working from a network drive or a USB drive can cause erratic behavior, such as file corruption, an inability to save changes you've made to your project, and loss of resources.
Here's a helpful article for you.
You saved me from a headache. Thank you
Glad you were able to get some assistance here Nina! Thanks for sharing :)
Just had this corrupted file thing happen to me with a file created on a trial version then corrupted after I put in the licence number. I was devastated that I had lost a weeks worth of work! Muhammad - thanks so much for the suggestion! You saved my project!!!
Glad this thread helped you out Wanda, and to prevent future file corruption, I'd look at ensuring you're working on projects as described here.
I'm having the same issue after getting a new computer and copying all my files to the new computer. Nothing mentioned earlier in any of the strings works. Thank you for the help.
Hi John! I am unable to open your project file and the .zip file states that it is invalid.
Are you still able to open the files on the other computer? If so, you may consider utilizing the collaborative workflow to move the files.
The motherboard fried on the other computer and I was able to salvage the hard drive and transfer the information to the new computer. All the files seem to work from the hard drive except the Articulate files so it almost seems like they needed something from the old computer for them to work.
Hi John! You are welcome to reach out to our support team to see if there is a possible resolution, but typically corruption cannot be corrected.
This is the error message I get when trying to open your file John. The last time I got that error, I lost about 100 hours of work. :(
Thanks for testing it out. I had a really good tech try and figure it out to no avail. A have the published file on a drive and it works great. Too bad it can't be unpublished.
I just had this issue happen to me and none of the options proposed by Storyline staff worked for me.
Instead, I used a third party application called ShadowExplorer to recover a version of the file before it was corrupted. It worked like a charm.
Hi Jordan,
Thanks for sharing that here and I'm happy to hear it worked for you.
Hi,
I have a course which I had created in Storyline 2, so for me there is no migration issue from SL1 to 2. But I still get similar error that the file is corrupt and so on. And I asked my company IT guy to do whatever possible to recover that 1 hr long e-learning module which was supposed to be updated on our LMS the earliest. Now, it's certainly a pain to redo everything from scratch.
I believe this bug needs to be resolved the earliest. Or going by the old formula which is certainly relevant - to keep multiple copies of the file at different location before we update anything in the original. :(
Hi Deepak,
I'm sorry to hear you ran into a corruption issue with your .story file.
Hi Ashley, Thanks for sharing the best practice.
However, for some reason I did not locate the latest project file in that temp location. So, I kind of worked on that from scratch.
Hi Deepak,
I'm sorry to hear that - it's not a guarantee that they're located there, but I know it's worked for a lot of users so it is definitely worth checking. Please let us know if you need anything else.
Hello Ashley,
Sorry If I'm posting the question on old thread. Googled and landed on this page.
I'm working on Articulate Stroyline 2.0 and got this error message "This project is invalid or corrupt and cannot be opened. It may have been created in an earlier version of Storyline.
All my project is ready and suddenly the file got corrupted is there any auto-saved available and please guide me how to get back my project.
Please reply me.. Waiting for your help.... !
Thanks, Sri Harsha Kotamarthy (Technical Writer, India)
Hi Sri,
No apologies necessary - you're welcome to pop into old threads. If you're using Storyline 2 you may want to try the steps here to follow and see if there is another copy of your file in the temp folders:
Thanks Ashely. This solution worked for me. Hereafter, I'm gonna keep backup of the file every hour.
How you are going to face this challenge, meaning, when can we expect a permanent solution update for this issue.
Glad to hear that you were able to recover your file Sri!
Unless we get down to the bottom of what caused your corruption, it would be difficult to say what the long-term solution would be.
I would advise that if you run into any difficulty again that you work directly with our support team so that we can try to identify the root cause of the issue.
At the same time, I'm sure we all hope it does not happen again to warrant this need.
Hi Muhammad
Thank for sharing your experience. I also nearly lost 2 days of my work!
i have just had the same experience and while it is nice to have a community try to find work-arounds, this is an issue and needs to be fixed. Comments from staff such as "I'm sure we all hope it doesn't happen again" are not good enough - unless the bug is identified and fixed, it will happen again. I'm sure you won't be putting the warning "Please note, projects are prone to corruption at any stage and may be unrecoverable" on the purchase page or that Storyline 2 is unstable. My 3 day project is now unrecoverable and has to be rebuilt.
Hi Andy,
I'm sorry you've run into this issue and error message. I know that our team has continued to investigate things such as this, but since the way in which users see that message has not been consistent it's difficult to have pinpointed the particular issue needed to be fixed. If you'd like to connect with our team and share your .story file as a sample and the steps you went through just before the error message that would be helpful in tracking down the root cause of such. You can send the file along privately here to our team.