I can't find my read only documents

[hcwesterveld]

I have a personal license and 5 editable documents. When I go to my resent data I can see the read only documents flash by and disappear. For a project I would like to take one document and make some small changes before putting it on my mill. But I can't get to it...

I wonder if it is linked to the 2 new updates I recently received or if something else is wrong?

[Phil.E]

Hi,

Can you please look on the Editable Documents list? It looks like this:

[hcwesterveld]

Thank you Phil,

Under editable documents, I see only my editable documents. When I don't need a document, because a project I work on is on the back burner, I put it in Read Only mode. These documents are not visible under Editable documents.

When I go to My Recent Data, I see them appear and disappear in a flash and only the editable documents are left on the screen. So every time I put a document in read only it seems to disappear...

Not sure if you can access this, but this is a short video how my screen looks like when I go to My Recent Data...

https://www.dropbox.com/l/scl/AAAEUrJLs1IUYhm7E4jBbZLuJhuJOBvQwkY

I really appreciate your help.

[Phil.E]

Sorry for the wrong instructions, I misunderstood.

Does this condition persist after restarting your computer?

[hcwesterveld]

Yes, after restarting Fusion and after restarting the computer. I haven't try to reinstall Fusion as I am afraid to lose it for good...

[Phil.E]

Have you tried to browse to the location of the files? Recent data is just a view of recent activity, but your files are stored in projects and folders (which are stored in the cloud, not on your local machine)

[hcwesterveld]

Ah, no is the sort answer... would that be in My Documents? What would be the file extension?
I can do a full scan tomorrow, to check whether they are there and where they are.

Thank you, Phil.

[Phil.E]

Hi,

I'm referring to the Fusion 360 designs you are saving to the cloud. All Fusion 360 design data is saved in a safe cloud location that you can access from any computer logged into Fusion 360.

These designs are always saved into what is called a Project. This is a way to separate your major projects into containers. You can invite people to share your Projects on a project by project basis, to limit access to your overall file storage.

Inside a project is where your designs are stored. As you can see, I have browsed into a project called Hardware Library and am looking at the Read Only files that are stored here.

[hcwesterveld · Accepted solution]

Hi Phil,

Sorry for the slow response. We had to attend a funeral 😞

Anyway,  I tried to look online (learned something new here, so thank you).  This is the picture:

These are my editable documents, The same as I see on the desktop...

I have done a full search on my desktop, but there I can't find the file. So not sure how it is saved locally.
I had changed the status of another document and that seems to have disappeared too... So I am now trying a some order of actions to see if I can replicate that. Too me it looks all very funny... 🙁
[....]

Ah! While looking if I could link you to my web pages, I found a trash in the online project and there I found - what I think is most of - my documents...
Can it be that they are "auto deleted"??? Some I know I deleted, but certainly not all....

I will go on a recovery tour and then follow up on my experiment to see if I can replicate what is happening. In the mean time I have found them and I hope I can now recover them.

Thank you very much for your guidance and your patience!!! 👍 👏

Many thanks!!!

[Phil.E]

Sorry to hear of your loss, please accept my condolences.

Just to be clear about how Fusion stores designs:

• Fusion 360 is an application that operates locally on your computer. 
• When you open a design, Fusion downloads* it from your cloud storage (* if it is not already held in a temporary local cache that the application uses when you have recently opened a design -  in that case it opens directly from this hidden local storage cache to save time).
• When you save a design, Fusion sends the data to be stored in the cloud. 

Because of this, you cannot "lose" a file on your local machine. Right now you could erase your computer and your saved designs would be there after you installed Fusion again, and logged in again. And then the process listed above starts over as you open designs to work on them.

• The image below shows your local Fusion 360 application "data panel project list".
  • It has Projects (containers for files and folders).
  • If you double click on a project in your list, you can see the designs in it. From here you can open your designs. 

This is what my projects list looks like when I browse it in Fusion 360 on my local machine

This image shows what the contents of one of my projects look like. (while browsing to it from within the Fusion 360 application on my local machine.) This is also the "data panel" view, but it's what you see inside a Project.

In Fusion 360 application view of read only designs inside a project

To answer your questions:

I have done a full search on my desktop, but there I can't find the file. So not sure how it is saved locally.

Answer: Fusion does not store designs on your desktop, or on your local machine in a way that can be searched using Windows Search Tools.

Instead: Open Fusion 360 and browse to projects/folders/designs using the "data panel".

Can it be that they are "auto deleted"???

Answer: That is impossible. The Delete command is distinct from other commands and cannot run unless you select something, right click, and pick Delete from the menu as you see in the image below.

I will go on a recovery tour and then follow up on my experiment to see if I can replicate what is happening.

If you can repeat what you think you saw, it would help greatly to record it for me. I'm very interested in anything you find. If you are marking designs as read-only and these are being deleted, that's a critical issue I need to follow up on. A video recording would help. I'm testing this entire workflow as I write this response and cannot reproduce any un-warranted deletion of designs.

Thanks for responding, and helping me understand what you are experiencing. As always, glad to help.

[SETHAUGER · Accepted solution]

Had the same thing happen to me.. today.

click the "show data panel" 9 squares in a square icon in upper left

depending what menu you have open, you may have to click the home icon. If it's not there, 

possibly make sure the top menu is set to "All Projects" 

double click "admin project"

open the read only file from there.  once it's been opened there, it seems to populate in the other menus.

--seth

that's the only place i see my fusion documents i've set to "read only"  

after i open the document through that menu, it appears in my "recent data" 

[2621535109]

Thanks, I'm a beginner and you solved my problem. Thank you for all your discussions