Quicken Essentials for Mac my data is all gone!

NicoleWilde

I have Quicken Essentials for Mac version 1.7.4. Every day I click on the icon and it opens right into my current document, which is the only one I ever use. Today I clicked on it and instead got a dialogue box offering to open a document or create a new one. I have not backed up a long time (yes, bad, I know, lesson learned). I seriously need to recover this document. Can anyone please help?

NotACPA

Did the program itself open ... just with no data file?

Did you recently upgrade you MacOS?

NicoleWilde

NotACPA, I have not recently upgraded, specifically because I wanted to be sure Quicken Essentials would still work. It was working as of a few days ago. I can open the program. When the dialogue box I described came up I created a test file, so yes, that can open the program. I then tried File/Open Recent, but nothing came up other than the test one I just created.

NotACPA

Which MacOS are you currently running?

NicoleWilde

El Capitan 10.11.6

NicoleWilde

Does Quicken Essentials for Mac do automated backups?

NotACPA

I'm sorry, but this thread just progressed beyond my limited knowledge of Q Essentials.

Your problem doesn't appear to be OS related, because Essentials  will run on both El Capitan and Sierra (but not High Sierra and above).

SO, you'll just need to wait until one of the QMac SuperUsers comes along.

NicoleWilde

Yes, it's been running on the OS I'm using without a problem forever. Thank you anyway for trying to help. I hope of the QMac SuperUsers comes along soon, as this is pretty urgent.

jacobs

Well, we know Quicken Essentials runs under El Capitan, which you've verified. It seems odd that there is nothing under Open Recent, because that's provided by the macOS to Quicken; if it doesn't have a file to open, it seems to indicate your data file was moved, renamed or deleted.

The first thing I'd do is search your Mac. Open your Trash and look for you data file. (It won't open if it's in the Trash.) If there are any folders in the Trash, open them and look inside. (It's surprisingly easy to take a folder like Documents and accidentally move it to the Trash.)

Next you want to search your Mac for any and all Quicken Essentials data files. Essentials data files end with the file extension ".quickendata". Do you know where your data file was located previously? If yes, look there first. Then try a search in the Finder with Command-F and search for .quickendata.

If that fails, you want to look in places macOS normally keeps hidden away, such as the main Library folder (which is where later versions of Quicken Mac store their data files by default). You can do this with the Find command as well, but it requires a little knowledge to get there. After opening the Search (Find) window, and typing .quickendata in the test box, click the + icon to add an additional search parameter. Pull down the Kind drops-won menu and select Other. In the window that pops up, start typing "system" until you can see System files as a choice; select that. Now one more wrinkle: it now shows "System files" and next to it "aren't included" -- change the latter to "are included". If your .quickendata file is in a reserved folder like Library, it will now show up in the search results.

If that fails to find anything, it seems increasingly likely that your data file was deleted or significantly renamed. At this point, you'll need to look for automatic backups, manual backups or any backups whatsoever. 

NicoleWilde

Thanks, Jacobs for the suggestions. It is definitely not in the Trash. Not findable with the .quickendata search. And I've actually gone through the systematic search you describe in your last paragraph with a Quicken tech by phone that. All that could be found are backups from 2017. He then told me the program is no longer supported and there was nothing he could do. There are no automatic backups or any other kind of backups. No one uses this computer but me, and I for sure did not delete this file. I have no explanation for what happened but this is one hell of a glitch, as all my business accounting for half the year was on there. Thank you anyway.

jacobs

It's a big "glitch" for you, but there's unfortunately no likely way to determine whether it was Quicken Essentials, macOS, or something you inadvertently did. It's not normal for a Mac to delete a single file out of the blue. I've also never heard of Quicken Essentials deleting its own data file. By process of elimination, it's most likely you did something unknowingly, but we may never know -- and ultimately it doesn't matter if the file is gone.

I'm (pleasantly) surprised you even got Quicken Support to help you a bit on a long-discontinued program, but even if it was supported, there's nothing they could do to resurrect a missing file.

The only other thing I can think to do is try Disk First Aid on the extremely long shot that there's some directory corruption on your drive which, after repair, would magically reveal your still-existing file.

Maybe one of the other Mac experts here will have something else to suggest.  

At this moment, I know you don't need a lecture about the importance of backups, but sadly if you have no backup of your Mac, no backup of your Quicken data file, and you're using a long-discontinued piece of software on an old Mac with an old operating system, you are unfortunately courting disaster. You might run perfectly fine for years, but old hard drives do sometimes die or get corrupted. I urge anyone using a Mac to invest $70-$100 on an external hard drive so you can turn on the Mac's Time Machine software in the click of a couple buttons to have continuous backups without thinking about it ever again. It's inexpensive, it requires no work on your part other than flipping it on once, and it's your first, best life saver if anything ever goes south. And for critical files -- files it would cause you great pain to ever lose, whether it be Quicken data, photos, movies, music, or other documents -- do something additional to back them up, ideally in a location away from your Mac in case of a fire or theft. This can be a cloud-based backup service, or a hard drive you periodically use to make a disk image copy of your Mac and store at work or someplace away from your home. (iDrive is one of several online backup services, and currently has a deal for $7 for the first year of backup).

NicoleWilde

I guess what I don't understand is where this "single file" should have resided on my Mac, when Quicken Essentials does not generate automated backups like some of the newer Quicken programs do. The only Quicken files I see anywhere on my computer are old backups. But yes, it was great that the tech support person was willing to help me.

As far as backups, I had been backing up to an external LaCie 4TB drive, and at some point when I changed the name of that drive, my Time Machine stopped backing up and I didn't realize it. I also have Backblaze (cloud backup), which apparently does not back up Quicken. I did not realize that until today. Thanks again for your input.

jacobs

Backblaze should backup Quicken files... unless your file lives in some location that Backblaze is set to not back up. 

I'm sorry, I don't know if there was a default location for an Essentials data file. Can you use your old Time Machine to see where the data file was at that time, and then make certain there's no data file there under any possibly different name.

NicoleWilde

Good suggestion about Time Machine. I did that and unfortunately, the only files that can be found that way are from 2 years ago. I will also try running Disk First Aid, although like you I'm pretty skeptical that will do it. It certainly seems as though the file was deleted, although it's hard to imagine how it happened, as I'm the only user and I'm seriously paranoid about deleting anything except RAW photo files I no longer need.

jacobs

When you looked at Time Machine, where did you find the .quickendata file living? Even though you might have moved it since then, I was just hoping for some clue about where your Quicken Essentials data file had been. 

NicoleWilde

I think part of the problem is that at some point I had renamed my external hard drives, not realizing that it would cause problems with backups that were going to the drives under their old names.

NicoleWilde

But, that was a while back and Quicken had been fine long after that, so I don't even think that was the issue. Anyway, I really appreciate all of your help with troubleshooting. At this point I think I'm going to end up having to try to reconstruct half the years' accounting from receipts.