Recovering Interrupted Song File Editing

If you are editing a song and your computer system or Composer program is abnormally terminated for any reason, you can still recover most of the work in progress on the song. Reasons that the Composer program might abnormally terminate include disruption of power to your computer, or hanging of the Windows operating system due to external causes.

Composer completely backs up your work periodically, which is every 10 minutes by default. You can set the backup frequency to a shorter or longer period, according to instructions described later in this topic. Composer backs up your work with a minimal interruption to your keyboard or mouse activity. You will probably never notice that the back up is in progress. Composer will display "Auto-save <filename>..." in the status bar at the bottom of Composer's window, probably faster than you will be able to read it.

Composer stores backup files in the Recover subdirectory of your \Program Files\Notation\Composer directory. The backup file will have the same name as the file you are working on, except that "-Recover", plus a number (eg, -Recover-2) will be added to the end of the file name. For example, if you are working on MySong.not, the backup file will be named MySong-Recover-1.not. The recovery files are renumbered upon each backup, so that the most recently is always (or almost always) the one numbered 1.

Note that this backup and recovery system is not intended as a solution for normal backup of your music work in progress. If you are composing and arranging a song, and are about to make some major changes to the song that you are not sure you want to keep, then you should explicitly save a backup copy of the song using the File menu Save As command.

The Undo command is useful for reversing recent changes you have made to the song. Manually saving and restoring a backup copy using the File menu Save As and Open commands is the appropriate procedure for saving and returning to a major earlier juncture in your song composing or arranging project. Composer's file recovery feature is useful in the case that your system or Composer abnormally terminates.

The Auto Save Recovery option is enabled by default when you first install Composer.

1.	Choose the Auto Save Recovery Options command in the File menu.

2.	Turn on the check mark for "Enable auto-save (backup) of song data."

The next time you view the Auto Save Recovery Options command name in the File menu, you will see a check mark by it.

Follow the previous procedure, and enter the auto-save frequency, measured in minutes.

To recover a file after your computer system or Composer has abnormally terminated:

1.	Choose the Recover Auto-Saved File command in the File menu.

Composer will display a File Open dialog box, and will pre-select your Program Files\Notation\Composer\Recover directory.

2.	In the Recover subdirectory, search for the files that match the name of the file you were working on when Composer was interrupted. Open the recovery file with the same name, with "-Recover-1" at the end of the name, as that usually will be the most recently backed up copy of your file.

3.	Review the opened recovered file. Compare it with the original file. Do not replace the original file if the recovered file is not newer. You can determine this by recalling what changes to the song you recently made.

4.	Optionally, rename the original file, or make a backup copy of it, just in case you have made a mistake in assessing that the recovered file is more recent.

5.	While viewing the recovered file, use the Save As command in the File menu to rename it to the original file name, and to save it in the original file's directory.

IMPORTANT: Do not forget step 5! If you skip this step, and later use the File Save command, your work will be saved in the MySong-Recover.not file instead of the original file.