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author | Bram Moolenaar <bram@zimbu.org> |
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date | Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:52:26 +0100 |
parents | 5232b9862f23 |
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1 *usr_11.txt* For Vim version 7.2. Last change: 2009 Oct 29 |
7 | 2 |
3 VIM USER MANUAL - by Bram Moolenaar | |
4 | |
5 Recovering from a crash | |
6 | |
7 | |
8 Did your computer crash? And you just spent hours editing? Don't panic! Vim | |
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9 stores enough information to be able to restore most of your work. This |
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10 chapter shows you how to get your work back and explains how the swap file is |
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11 used. |
7 | 12 |
13 |11.1| Basic recovery | |
14 |11.2| Where is the swap file? | |
15 |11.3| Crashed or not? | |
16 |11.4| Further reading | |
17 | |
18 Next chapter: |usr_12.txt| Clever tricks | |
19 Previous chapter: |usr_10.txt| Making big changes | |
20 Table of contents: |usr_toc.txt| | |
21 | |
22 ============================================================================== | |
23 *11.1* Basic recovery | |
24 | |
25 In most cases recovering a file is quite simple, assuming you know which file | |
26 you were editing (and the harddisk is still working). Start Vim on the file, | |
27 with the "-r" argument added: > | |
28 | |
29 vim -r help.txt | |
30 | |
31 Vim will read the swap file (used to store text you were editing) and may read | |
32 bits and pieces of the original file. If all is well, you will see these | |
33 messages (with different file names, of course): | |
34 | |
35 Using swap file ".help.txt.swp" ~ | |
36 Original file "~/vim/runtime/doc/help.txt" ~ | |
323 | 37 Recovery completed. You should check if everything is OK. ~ |
7 | 38 (You might want to write out this file under another name ~ |
39 and run diff with the original file to check for changes) ~ | |
40 Delete the .swp file afterwards. ~ | |
41 | |
42 To be on the safe side, write this file under another name: > | |
43 | |
44 :write help.txt.recovered | |
45 | |
46 Compare the file with the original file to check if you ended up with what you | |
47 expected. Vimdiff is very useful for this |08.7|. Watch out for the original | |
48 file to contain a more recent version (you saved the file just before the | |
49 computer crashed). And check that no lines are missing (something went wrong | |
50 that Vim could not recover). | |
51 If Vim produces warning messages when recovering, read them carefully. | |
52 This is rare though. | |
53 | |
54 It's normal that the last few changes can not be recovered. Vim flushes the | |
55 changes to disk when you don't type for about four seconds, or after typing | |
56 about two hundred characters. This is set with the 'updatetime' and | |
57 'updatecount' options. Thus when Vim didn't get a chance to save itself when | |
58 the system went down, the changes after the last flush will be lost. | |
59 | |
60 If you were editing without a file name, give an empty string as argument: > | |
61 | |
62 vim -r "" | |
63 | |
64 You must be in the right directory, otherwise Vim can't find the swap file. | |
65 | |
66 ============================================================================== | |
67 *11.2* Where is the swap file? | |
68 | |
69 Vim can store the swap file in several places. Normally it is in the same | |
70 directory as the original file. To find it, change to the directory of the | |
71 file, and use: > | |
72 | |
73 vim -r | |
74 | |
75 Vim will list the swap files that it can find. It will also look in other | |
76 directories where the swap file for files in the current directory may be | |
77 located. It will not find swap files in any other directories though, it | |
78 doesn't search the directory tree. | |
79 The output could look like this: | |
80 | |
81 Swap files found: ~ | |
82 In current directory: ~ | |
83 1. .main.c.swp ~ | |
84 owned by: mool dated: Tue May 29 21:00:25 2001 ~ | |
85 file name: ~mool/vim/vim6/src/main.c ~ | |
86 modified: YES ~ | |
87 user name: mool host name: masaka.moolenaar.net ~ | |
88 process ID: 12525 ~ | |
89 In directory ~/tmp: ~ | |
90 -- none -- ~ | |
91 In directory /var/tmp: ~ | |
92 -- none -- ~ | |
93 In directory /tmp: ~ | |
94 -- none -- ~ | |
95 | |
96 If there are several swap files that look like they may be the one you want to | |
97 use, a list is given of these swap files and you are requested to enter the | |
98 number of the one you want to use. Carefully look at the dates to decide | |
99 which one you want to use. | |
100 In case you don't know which one to use, just try them one by one and check | |
101 the resulting files if they are what you expected. | |
102 | |
103 | |
104 USING A SPECIFIC SWAP FILE | |
105 | |
106 If you know which swap file needs to be used, you can recover by giving the | |
107 swap file name. Vim will then finds out the name of the original file from | |
108 the swap file. | |
109 | |
110 Example: > | |
111 vim -r .help.txt.swo | |
112 | |
113 This is also handy when the swap file is in another directory than expected. | |
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114 Vim recognizes files with the pattern *.s[uvw][a-z] as swap files. |
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115 |
7 | 116 If this still does not work, see what file names Vim reports and rename the |
117 files accordingly. Check the 'directory' option to see where Vim may have | |
118 put the swap file. | |
119 | |
120 Note: | |
121 Vim tries to find the swap file by searching the directories in the | |
122 'dir' option, looking for files that match "filename.sw?". If | |
123 wildcard expansion doesn't work (e.g., when the 'shell' option is | |
124 invalid), Vim does a desperate try to find the file "filename.swp". | |
125 If that fails too, you will have to give the name of the swapfile | |
126 itself to be able to recover the file. | |
127 | |
128 ============================================================================== | |
129 *11.3* Crashed or not? *ATTENTION* *E325* | |
130 | |
131 Vim tries to protect you from doing stupid things. Suppose you innocently | |
132 start editing a file, expecting the contents of the file to show up. Instead, | |
133 Vim produces a very long message: | |
134 | |
135 E325: ATTENTION ~ | |
136 Found a swap file by the name ".main.c.swp" ~ | |
137 owned by: mool dated: Tue May 29 21:09:28 2001 ~ | |
138 file name: ~mool/vim/vim6/src/main.c ~ | |
139 modified: no ~ | |
140 user name: mool host name: masaka.moolenaar.net ~ | |
141 process ID: 12559 (still running) ~ | |
142 While opening file "main.c" ~ | |
143 dated: Tue May 29 19:46:12 2001 ~ | |
144 ~ | |
145 (1) Another program may be editing the same file. ~ | |
146 If this is the case, be careful not to end up with two ~ | |
147 different instances of the same file when making changes. ~ | |
148 Quit, or continue with caution. ~ | |
149 ~ | |
150 (2) An edit session for this file crashed. ~ | |
151 If this is the case, use ":recover" or "vim -r main.c" ~ | |
152 to recover the changes (see ":help recovery"). ~ | |
153 If you did this already, delete the swap file ".main.c.swp" ~ | |
154 to avoid this message. ~ | |
155 | |
156 You get this message, because, when starting to edit a file, Vim checks if a | |
157 swap file already exists for that file. If there is one, there must be | |
158 something wrong. It may be one of these two situations. | |
159 | |
160 1. Another edit session is active on this file. Look in the message for the | |
161 line with "process ID". It might look like this: | |
162 | |
163 process ID: 12559 (still running) ~ | |
164 | |
165 The text "(still running)" indicates that the process editing this file | |
166 runs on the same computer. When working on a non-Unix system you will not | |
167 get this extra hint. When editing a file over a network, you may not see | |
168 the hint, because the process might be running on another computer. In | |
169 those two cases you must find out what the situation is yourself. | |
170 If there is another Vim editing the same file, continuing to edit will | |
171 result in two versions of the same file. The one that is written last will | |
172 overwrite the other one, resulting in loss of changes. You better quit | |
173 this Vim. | |
174 | |
175 2. The swap file might be the result from a previous crash of Vim or the | |
176 computer. Check the dates mentioned in the message. If the date of the | |
177 swap file is newer than the file you were editing, and this line appears: | |
178 | |
179 modified: YES ~ | |
180 | |
181 Then you very likely have a crashed edit session that is worth recovering. | |
182 If the date of the file is newer than the date of the swap file, then | |
183 either it was changed after the crash (perhaps you recovered it earlier, | |
184 but didn't delete the swap file?), or else the file was saved before the | |
185 crash but after the last write of the swap file (then you're lucky: you | |
237 | 186 don't even need that old swap file). Vim will warn you for this with this |
7 | 187 extra line: |
188 | |
189 NEWER than swap file! ~ | |
190 | |
191 | |
192 UNREADABLE SWAP FILE | |
193 | |
194 Sometimes the line | |
195 | |
196 [cannot be read] ~ | |
197 | |
237 | 198 will appear under the name of the swap file. This can be good or bad, |
7 | 199 depending on circumstances. |
200 | |
201 It is good if a previous editing session crashed without having made any | |
237 | 202 changes to the file. Then a directory listing of the swap file will show |
203 that it has zero bytes. You may delete it and proceed. | |
7 | 204 |
237 | 205 It is slightly bad if you don't have read permission for the swap file. You |
206 may want to view the file read-only, or quit. On multi-user systems, if you | |
7 | 207 yourself did the last changes under a different login name, a logout |
237 | 208 followed by a login under that other name might cure the "read error". Or |
7 | 209 else you might want to find out who last edited (or is editing) the file and |
210 have a talk with them. | |
211 | |
212 It is very bad if it means there is a physical read error on the disk | |
213 containing the swap file. Fortunately, this almost never happens. | |
214 You may want to view the file read-only at first (if you can), to see the | |
215 extent of the changes that were "forgotten". If you are the one in charge of | |
216 that file, be prepared to redo your last changes. | |
217 | |
218 | |
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219 WHAT TO DO? *swap-exists-choices* |
7 | 220 |
221 If dialogs are supported you will be asked to select one of five choices: | |
222 | |
223 Swap file ".main.c.swp" already exists! ~ | |
224 [O]pen Read-Only, (E)dit anyway, (R)ecover, (Q)uit, (A)bort, (D)elete it: ~ | |
225 | |
226 O Open the file readonly. Use this when you just want to view the file and | |
227 don't need to recover it. You might want to use this when you know someone | |
228 else is editing the file, but you just want to look in it and not make | |
229 changes. | |
230 | |
231 E Edit the file anyway. Use this with caution! If the file is being edited | |
232 in another Vim, you might end up with two versions of the file. Vim will | |
233 try to warn you when this happens, but better be safe then sorry. | |
234 | |
235 R Recover the file from the swap file. Use this if you know that the swap | |
236 file contains changes that you want to recover. | |
237 | |
238 Q Quit. This avoids starting to edit the file. Use this if there is another | |
239 Vim editing the same file. | |
240 When you just started Vim, this will exit Vim. When starting Vim with | |
241 files in several windows, Vim quits only if there is a swap file for the | |
242 first one. When using an edit command, the file will not be loaded and you | |
243 are taken back to the previously edited file. | |
244 | |
245 A Abort. Like Quit, but also abort further commands. This is useful when | |
246 loading a script that edits several files, such as a session with multiple | |
247 windows. | |
248 | |
249 D Delete the swap file. Use this when you are sure you no longer need it. | |
250 For example, when it doesn't contain changes, or when the file itself is | |
251 newer than the swap file. | |
252 On Unix this choice is only offered when the process that created the | |
253 swap file does not appear to be running. | |
254 | |
255 If you do not get the dialog (you are running a version of Vim that does not | |
256 support it), you will have to do it manually. To recover the file, use this | |
257 command: > | |
258 | |
259 :recover | |
260 | |
261 | |
262 Vim cannot always detect that a swap file already exists for a file. This is | |
263 the case when the other edit session puts the swap files in another directory | |
264 or when the path name for the file is different when editing it on different | |
265 machines. Therefore, don't rely on Vim always warning you. | |
266 | |
267 If you really don't want to see this message, you can add the 'A' flag to the | |
268 'shortmess' option. But it's very unusual that you need this. | |
269 | |
270 ============================================================================== | |
271 *11.4* Further reading | |
272 | |
273 |swap-file| An explanation about where the swap file will be created and | |
274 what its name is. | |
275 |:preserve| Manually flushing the swap file to disk. | |
276 |:swapname| See the name of the swap file for the current file. | |
277 'updatecount' Number of key strokes after which the swap file is flushed to | |
278 disk. | |
279 'updatetime' Timeout after which the swap file is flushed to disk. | |
280 'swapsync' Whether the disk is synced when the swap file is flushed. | |
281 'directory' List of directory names where to store the swap file. | |
282 'maxmem' Limit for memory usage before writing text to the swap file. | |
283 'maxmemtot' Same, but for all files in total. | |
284 | |
285 ============================================================================== | |
286 | |
287 Next chapter: |usr_12.txt| Clever tricks | |
288 | |
289 Copyright: see |manual-copyright| vim:tw=78:ts=8:ft=help:norl: |