While working on a sketch, the web editor started acting very strange. I could not copy or past any of my program code. Wile trying to close the session, I received a pop up window that script may not be saved. I exited anyway. When I tried to get back into the arduino web editor, i was tolded that I was activating it as though it was the first time. I cannot get past the user agreement page. I cannnot even get to my sketches which I have many. Please help. Some of my work is critical.
A note from one of the Arduino team members on the last thread reporting a lost sketch:
http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=563779
matteosuppo:
Please, when something like this happens, write to support@arduino.cc with the url of the sketch, so that we may verify what happened
So definitely send them an email
ayousef:
Some of my work is critical.
I know this won't help you now, but in the future you should always be sure to have a backup of critical work. Trusting it to a single cloud storage system is a very bad idea. I would also recommend you to start using a version control system like git. Unfortunately the Arduino Web Editor does not make either of these things very easy.
For future reference, there is a forum section dedicated to the Arduino Web Editor (AKA Arduino Create):
http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?board=101.0
where people knowledgeable on this topic are more likely to see your post. I have requested this thread be moved there.
I also have the same problem with the user agreement page, and have reported it here:
http://forum.arduino.cc/index.php?topic=567063
I suspect that once that problem is resolved you'll be able to access your sketches like always.
Are ALL your sketches missing or just particular ones ?
Out of curiosity were the two sketches similar named ?
Chasing my own lead on the AWOL sketches and found it more prevalent with closely similar named sketches where the first parts of the sketch name are the same eg. test_sketch_01 and test_sketch_02.
Or maybe ending in "COPY" or even "COPY-COPY" etc.
SimoDD:
The whole idea of a cloud system is that it is a secure redundant storage system!
Nope. The whole idea of a cloud system is that you are running or storing something on someone else's computer. That's all. That computer might be part of a secure redundant storage system or it might not. I've never seen any claims that the Arduino Web Editor is a secure redundant storage system. Have you?
SimoDD:
Clearly what you meant to say was... "trusting it to the Arduino Create developers is a very bad idea..."
No. What I meant was that trusting important data to ANY single storage solution is a very bad idea. That's just common sense. I don't single out the Arduino Create developers in that statement. Of course I would have more confidence in a paid service that is specifically advertised as a secure redundant data storage system but even then I wouldn't trust it with the sole copy of important data.
@SimoDD
Some countermeasures were put in place to help with the issue.
Clearly they are not as effective yet as they should be.
From a create testers POV I have not seen the issue since those measures were put in.
In most cases Pert, others and myself have suggested that people use some form of version control just as any professional programmers would do.
I noticed that some of the AWOL sketches seemed to be a bit more prevalent when just using the "save as" with the COPY extensions so would avoid doing that and go for a more personal approach such as "V2_DD_MM_YY" etc.
As an IT pro I dont even trust my own computers to be 100% reliable and they back up on a very regular basis so in the event of a major incident I can bring them back to life quickly.
Additionally I know the user base is HUGE for CREATE yet the AWOL incidents by my calculations are less than .05 %. That is in no small part thanks to those behind it who take every issue as important but I realise that is no comfort to you at this point.
Thanks for the feedback.
I think your estimate may be off about the frequency of occurrence, based on the fact that all but one of my posts about this were deleted from the forum. I also seriously doubt that even a small proportion of those affected report it here. There seems to be no point if one's posts will be deleted anyway. (I'm interested to see if this post survives :o)
What confuses me is that there seems to be an attitude here that this problem needs to be played down and hidden from users, as if it's not serious, whereas the sensible thing would be to warn users that this problem exists and to take countermeasures such as backups before it happens. Any data loss on any system is always a serious issue that should be well publicised.
Even worse is the attitude on this forum that it was my fault that it happened because I was foolish enough to trust the system in the first place and not make backups!
Fortunately I have managed to find a superior IDE solution so I won't be affected again.
The forum has a ZERO TOLERANCE for swearing and FUD which is why some of your posts were deleted as they were clearly in violation of both those aspects and possibly others and nothing to do with your assumption that they were deleted to hide figures.
As far as the frequency of users getting AWOL sketches I was given a confidential number for the ACTUAL user base and remain an active tester so my advice is more based on facts than guesses.
Fact that the AWOL SKETCH issue original posts have not been modified and remain for all to see further negates your assumptions. As do comments from one of the team themselves to user's who have suffered to post the URL etc.
I certainly dont think you were treated as foolish. I do however note that you were given help to mitigate the AWOL issue based on anything we should all be doing.
I can assure you they take many things on board and have never shown to me that they would deliberately obfuscate things. Simply reading the many posts where the team has stepped in should be enough assurance for that.