4 ms·

Sorry for your relatives experience, that must be very distressing for them. However, this also shows why having a "backup" is always a good idea. So when/if

by pwg 4y ago

Sorry for your relatives experience, that must be very distressing for them. However, this also shows why having a "backup" is always a good idea. So when/if you do recover what you can recover, you might also consider setting them up with some form of automatic backup such that should this (or a disk failure, which is always a possibility) occur in the future, recovery can be "restore from latest backup" instead of the task you are now facing.

raffraffraff 4y ago
Haha, I asked "Is there a backup?". Answer: "Yes, but it's from months ago"
- inetsee 4y ago
  A backup from months ago is (somewhat) better than a backup from years ago or no backup at all.
- layer8 4y ago
  Buy them a second drive (if possible) and activate File History with that drive as the target.
magicalhippo 4y ago
Of course backup is always a good idea. However, an equally good idea when faced with a sudden and utterly unexpected situation, is to not immediately try to solve the problem without understanding what actually happened. The chances of the "fix" doing more harm than good is high. That said, consumer software should definitely not assume that the user understands how the internals work. In this case, rather than a popup being shows, it would have been more appropriate to give the user a full-screen walkthrough, similar to the first-launch experience, explaining what has happene, what Windows has done, that the documents and pictures are most likely safe, and finally include warnings about the active profile, and associated documents and pictures, being deleted when logging out.
- herpderperator 4y ago
  I think it would be infinitely better if Windows refused to log the user on. What good is it to log someone onto their supposed account which is actually just an empty account? I would be much better to show an error at login saying there is a problem with the account and a question like "Would you like to log in as a guest user?"
  - magicalhippo 4y ago
    > I would be much better to show an error at login saying there is a problem with the account and a question like "Would you like to log in as a guest user?" That's basically what I was suggesting.

by pwg 4y ago

raffraffraff 4y ago

Haha, I asked "Is there a backup?". Answer: "Yes, but it's from months ago"

inetsee 4y ago
A backup from months ago is (somewhat) better than a backup from years ago or no backup at all.
layer8 4y ago
Buy them a second drive (if possible) and activate File History with that drive as the target.

magicalhippo 4y ago

Of course backup is always a good idea. However, an equally good idea when faced with a sudden and utterly unexpected situation, is to not immediately try to solve the problem without understanding what actually happened. The chances of the "fix" doing more harm than good is high. That said, consumer software should definitely not assume that the user understands how the internals work. In this case, rather than a popup being shows, it would have been more appropriate to give the user a full-screen walkthrough, similar to the first-launch experience, explaining what has happene, what Windows has done, that the documents and pictures are most likely safe, and finally include warnings about the active profile, and associated documents and pictures, being deleted when logging out.

herpderperator 4y ago
I think it would be infinitely better if Windows refused to log the user on. What good is it to log someone onto their supposed account which is actually just an empty account? I would be much better to show an error at login saying there is a problem with the account and a question like "Would you like to log in as a guest user?"
- magicalhippo 4y ago
  > I would be much better to show an error at login saying there is a problem with the account and a question like "Would you like to log in as a guest user?" That's basically what I was suggesting.