Undo deletion of Snippet collection

[primeminister]

Hi all,

 

I accidentally deleted the whole collection instead of one snippet. Is there a way to retrieve that? Maybe something on the file system in the Library folder? 

Thanks in advance for your help.

- Charlie

[Vero]

@primeminister Your best bet is to go to Time Machine and find your Alfred.alfredpreferences file from prior to the deletion, as this file will contain all of your snippets. 

 

You can then either replace the entire Alfred.alfredpreferences file, or navigate within the package contents to grab the folder of snippets that matches the one you've accidentally deleted.

 

Cheers,
Vero

[primeminister]

Thanks @Vero, I did not think of that backup that I have every day

[vitor]

For those without backups that land here, if you sync your Alfred preferences with Dropbox you can go to the website and recover what you deleted, or revert things to a previous time.

[Andrew]

This thread has made me take a fresh look at how Alfred deletes snippets, and I've made a change to now move to trash for both snippets / collections and workflows instead of removing them. This will make it into the next Alfred release

[primeminister]

Great Andrew!!

 

[i05]

Besides putting back the deleted directory from Trash (that is a great work indeed, Andrew), I found we can restore the accidentally deleted folder if you sync "Alfred.alfredpreferences" with Dropbox. Although the preference file looks a file on Mac, you can see the folder on Dropbox.com.

[Sucesso]

On 4/17/2018 at 10:02 AM, Andrew said:

This thread has made me take a fresh look at how Alfred deletes snippets, and I've made a change to now move to trash for both snippets / collections and workflows instead of removing them. This will make it into the next Alfred release

Don't mean to revive a very old thread, but is this a feature now? I don't need it now, but I always like moving to trash as an intermediate step.

[AlfredV]

On 4/17/2018 at 7:02 PM, Andrew said:

This thread has made me take a fresh look at how Alfred deletes snippets, and I've made a change to now move to trash for both snippets / collections and workflows instead of removing them. This will make it into the next Alfred release

Is this now live? I cannot even find "Trash" in the app...

[AlfredV]

On 4/16/2018 at 11:46 AM, vitor said:

For those without backups that land here, if you sync your Alfred preferences with Dropbox you can go to the website and recover what you deleted, or revert things to a previous time.

How do I sync with Dropbox?

[vitor]

Welcome @AlfredV,

 

47 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

I cannot even find "Trash" in the app

 

It refers to the macOS Trash Bin. Deleting snippets and workflows sends them there when possible.

 

48 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

How do I sync with Dropbox?

 

Syncing Your Alfred Settings Between Macs.

[AlfredV]

10 minutes ago, vitor said:

Welcome @AlfredV,

 

 

It refers to the macOS Trash Bin. Deleting snippets and workflows sends them there when possible.

 

 

Syncing Your Alfred Settings Between Macs.

I thought so, but I checked and they are not in my Trash Bin! :-(

 

[vitor]

What version of Alfred are you on, and where are your preferences stored?

[AlfredV]

2 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

And thanks for the link to Syncing. It seems to be used for two Macs, but I guess it works for 1 just as well?

 

 

[vitor]

Yes, it works for a single Mac too.

[AlfredV]

2 minutes ago, vitor said:

What version of Alfred are you on, and where are your preferences stored?

I have the 4.7

You mean Alfred.alfredpreferences: users/library/application support/alfred

[vitor]

Can you record your screen while you’re doing the deletion?

[AlfredV]

1 minute ago, vitor said:

Can you record your screen while you’re doing the deletion?

Possibly, but there is nothing left to delete! All my snippets are gone.

[vitor]

How did you delete them in the first place? You’re giving information piece meal, but we need as much information as possible to understand your case. It took seven posts to reveal you can’t see your snippets, when that’s the crux of it. Please describe in detail your case and how you got to it.

Edited July 25, 2022 by vitor

[AlfredV]

10 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

I have the 4.7

You mean Alfred.alfredpreferences: users/library/application support/alfred

 

5 minutes ago, vitor said:

How did you delete them in the first place? You’re giving information piece meal, but we need as much information as possible to understand your case. It took seven posts to reveal you can’t see your snippets, when that’s the crux of it. Please describe in detail your case and how you got to it.

<deep sigh>  This thread is called Undo deletion of Snippet collection right?

 

ALL my snippets were accidentally deleted because I used the wrong "-". This happened to me once before and I was able to retrieve them then, but no longer know how. My Time Machine has not been active for a while.

 

BTW: the Show in Finder path is incorrect! 

And it is REALLY hard using finder when your name is Alfred (which mine is), because thousands of files come up.

[vitor]

It’s common for people to post in the wrong thread or have a tangential problem which needs a different solution. For example, deleting your snippets collection yourself by accident is different than it disappearing without you knowing why. Those issues have different causes and thus different solutions.

 

You asked about syncing with Dropbox but that’s no longer relevant. It would only have helped if you had them synced beforehand. But I can only tell you this after knowing what you were really trying to do.

 

I’m actively trying to help you, but to do that I need your cooperation. Only you have access to your data and the necessary information to figure out what happened. I can give you clues on how to proceed, but only if I understand the details. I just tried to delete a snippet collection and I’m seeing it in the Trash, so the feature is working. If it didn’t in your case, we need to figure out what is different about your setup.

 

17 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

BTW: the Show in Finder path is incorrect!

 

I don’t know what you’re referring to in this case.

[AlfredV]

10 minutes ago, vitor said:

It’s common for people to post in the wrong thread or have a tangential problem which needs a different solution. For example, deleting your snippets collection yourself by accident is different than it disappearing without you knowing why. Those issues have different causes and thus different solutions.

 

You asked about syncing with Dropbox but that’s no longer relevant. It would only have helped if you had them synced beforehand. But I can only tell you this after knowing what you were really trying to do.

 

I’m actively trying to help you, but to do that I need your cooperation. Only you have access to your data and the necessary information to figure out what happened. I can give you clues on how to proceed, but only if I understand the details. I just tried to delete a snippet collection and I’m seeing it in the Trash, so the feature is working. If it didn’t in your case, we need to figure out what is different about your setup.

 

 

I don’t know what you’re referring to in this case.

I think I am in the right thread and appreciate your help.

 

What would it look like in Trash? I really thought it would/should end up there.

 

The Show in Finder path that is given when I click this option in the Advanced tab says users/library/application support/alfred But this path did not seem to exist on my Mac: there is no Library map. However, it appeared to be hidden, it is grey in the Show in Finder. I have now unhidden it.

 

 

 

[vitor]

1 minute ago, AlfredV said:

I think I am in the right thread

 

You are!

 

1 minute ago, AlfredV said:

What would it look like in Trash?

 

It will be a folder with the name of your collection, containing each of your snippets as JSON files. Assuming the deletion happened recently, sorting your Trash’s contents by Date Added should be a good bet.

 

4 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

However, it appeared to be hidden

 

Yep, macOS does it by default.

[AlfredV]

5 minutes ago, vitor said:

 

You are!

 

 

It will be a folder with the name of your collection, containing each of your snippets as JSON files. Assuming the deletion happened recently, sorting your Trash’s contents by Date Added should be a good bet.

 

 

Yep, macOS does it by default.

I found it! It is called "Default Collection" and was dated July 21 for some reason, even though I made changes today. How do I get it back into the right directory?

[vitor]

3 minutes ago, AlfredV said:

How do I get it back into the right directory?

 

Move the folder into ~/Library/Application Support/Alfred/Alfred.alfredpreferences/snippets.