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Methodman85

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Saving an Office File from an Email Attachment

Hello,

I have a user that worked off a file she opened from an email. She saved the file many times, but now the file is gone.

I know the temp files get stored in C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Temp\notesC9812B
But what exactly makes them disappear even if you save them?

Thanks
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Nabs_Tech

It is by design. Email attachments are temporarily extracted in the TEMP folder so that it can be viewed. Even if the file is modified and saved, the file will disappear (and cannot be recovered) once the Email Application is closed.

An ideal way is to Open the attachment and use the Save As option to save the file in a Personal Folder.

Tough Luck :-(
If you have a recovery tool the file may show up in the scan.  But even at it's best the tools I use only work sporadically with Office Files.
Joust out of curisotiy, how do we know the file is "gone"? Is the user trying to open the file from within the email? Did the email get moved or deleted? Generally, files will stay in the temp folder until the email (or the attachment) is deleted. The only way I can think of that the file would go away would be if the temp files were cleared or corrupted, or if the emails were deleted (by the user, or by a policy)

Obviously it would have been better to do a Save As, which is best practices. But if you didn't, you can try a recovery tool. With recovery tools, the sooner the better.
Avatar of Methodman85

ASKER

Are there any good and free recovery tools that anyone can recommend.

I assume the file is gone because it is no longer in the users C:\Users\username\AppData\Local\Temp\notesC9812B location.

The recent files shortcuts in excel link the file to that location, in which it can no longer find it.
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Brad Sims
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