iCloud deleted my documents. How do I get them back

You are absolutely correct.

Just backing up your iPad or iPhone to iTunes does not save any of your icloud files.

Any document saved to iCloud is NOT backed up anywhere in any of your backups in time machine or iTunes.

They are effectively "owned" by Apple (i.e., held hostage by iCloud).

They don't tell us this!

You think your work is safe. It's not. It's ONLY in the cloud. It's not even saved anywhere permanently on your own mobile device.

If the cloud becacking up your iPad or iPhone to iTunes does not save any of your icloud files.

I work for three months on dozens of Pages files from an iPad that was not connected to the Internet.

When I later set up a brand-new iMac with Lion the new iCloud sent a signal to my iPad on the very first time it was connected to the Net and all of my files were then instantly deleted right before my eyes. I thought everything was safe in my Time Capsule or in iTunes and my other drive backups of time machine and iTunes. But nothing had been saved anywhere because any iOS file tagged as owned by iCloud is NOT saved OR backed up. Apple was no help recovering them and took no resposibility.

Rely on the iCloud at your own peril. Just as any hard drive will eventually crash so will your iCloud files.

JC

Atlanta

I can only tell you that it works absolutely fine on my iMac with OS X 10.8.2 and iOS 6 devices.

My iCloud documents are automatically synced into the ~/Library/Mobile Documents folder.

They are automatically backed up to Time Machine during normal backup cycles.

I can restore previous versions from the Mobile Documents folder from Time Machine, save it to the Desktop and open it from there directly in Pages or Numbers.

Documents created on my iPad are automatically synced in the background to my Mac and are then automatically backed up to Time Machine.

So basically, everything works the way it should...

Thank you very much! For some reason, I thought that these (hidden and on-line) folders were not backed up to Time Machine, but you are right, they are!

Although my loss was not that great, I've got mys stuff back.

I hope the other contributers to this thread have the same experience!

Not sure how to give you the 10 points, but you deserve them!

They are ONLY backed up if you have icloud on your desktop or other device and have ALSO accessed the cloud from them. Otherwise, no mobile folder (and no mobile ~tef file) is created. This is why thousands have lost their work that was only on their iPad. With icloud now being an inseperable part of Mountain Lion the mobile folder is created in the lIbrary by default. But this doesn't mean it can't become corrupted and destroy files.

Just lost all mine too, found the mobile folder but it only had the one new document that I just opened, and Pages on my iMac which I have been using shows no recent documents used, and all Pages documents have been lost, Numbers documents ok.

I guess time to get an even larger hard drive and use Time Machine now....

I unwittingly moved all of my Word files - almost a years worth of work - to iCloud when I was prompted to do so about six weeks ago. I then realised that they had been removed from my MacBook (how dare they do this without advising me!) and then they were nowhere to be seen on iCloud. After weeks of trying to find them and weeks of searching these forums, I decided to see if they might be lurking in the 'All my Files' section of the Finder. Lo and behold, there they were. All muddled up - but they were there. I had to manually move each file from All my Files down to newly created Files on my desktop, thus essentially dragging almost a years work file by file into their relavent files on the desktop. I then dragged them all back in to the Documents file on my hard drive, which is where they SHOULD have stayed, had Apple not removed them.

I will never sync with iCloud again, I certainly will not be purchasing the word processing software they are aggressively pushing (lets face it, this is why they are screwing around with our Word files - they want us to opt for their 'easier' option and buy their 'word' version) - I'm (once again) disgusted with this organisation. If I could turn back the clock and never buy Apple, I would. I'm seriously considering moving to Android.

I used to have an HTC Desire, which I have to say was absolutely on par with my iPhone. I grant you, a PC is rubbish compared to Mac and I'd be interested to see (after having a Mac for two years) if anything on the market comes close. From a SmartPhone perspective, my experience with HTC was awesome (and some of the functionality was actually easier, such as instantly sharing photos on social media...although I think the iPhone 5 is pretty awesome and looks great) - I'm particularly intrigued by the Samsung Galaxy S4. And I've got my head around having a larger screen (which used to strike me as clumsy and just too big) - I think because I now (like so many others) use my Smartphone for content rather than talking, a larger screen sounds great. I'm not that bothered about an iPad so a bigger screen SmartPhone would be a nice middle-ground.

Any idea if there is a PC / laptop out there with the speed and processing power of iOS?

Just Happened tu me. I have a macbook air, an ipad and iphone, all, of course, using the same icloud account.

I changed a file in pages yesterday. Today I tried to lauch it, but there was no internet signal, ok, gave up. BUT... When, now, I tried to launch ipad and mac asked me that there was 2 versions, and asked whick one to keep. Ok, I made my choice, the vers. of yesterday, in my mac. Suprise.... erased both... no more this file... search in mac, ipad, in internet at icloud.com and inside the hidden icloud folder... nothing... gone... that`s not the first time that happend... It`d be better icloud have a trash folder, so we can recover some mistakes....

If you are using time machine you can get all your files back easily.

alt click the go menu and choose library

open mobile documents

open the folder you want to restore eg Numbers

Then open time machine

go back until you see all the files reappear that have disappeared from iCloud..

hit restore

All you iCloud docs are stored on your Mac.. if not you could not access them when not connected to the internet!

Wait. This only works if you have previously opened your iCloud documents on your Mac.

If you have never locally opened the mobile docs folder then your Mac has no files. Same for cloud files not accessed on iPhone. There will be no mobile documents folder unless it got created when you accessed the cloud from a device.

My iCloud documents were all deleted when I set up a brand new mac with Mountain Lion a year and a half ago. I signed in and they all vanished. They never determined what the glitch was.

I thought all my work was safe, being on my iPad, that was itself backed up to Time Machine. But cloud docs are NOT backed up locally as a matter of Apple policy. I watched in horror as three months of Pages work disappeared before my very eyes when I opened my iPad to work. Apple engineers took three weeks to tell me nothing was recoverable. I ended up at least finding salvageable scraps of text spread around dozens of hidden files.

JC

Atlanta

This is my first time to use Apple Support Communities so I apologize if I'm not handling this correctly. Basically, I also opened Pages and Numbers yesterday and discovered all of my documents are gone. After reading through these posts, I logged into iCloud.com and when I opened Pages (marked "Beta"), all of my documents were there. But I don't know how to get them back onto my iPad. Can anyone offer advice or directions? Thank you.

Simplest way... open each document stored on the cloud and then choose MOVE TO in the file menu then move to your iPad documents folder or wherever. I don't know why your documents disappeared on your iPad but in theory each time you edit or open a document on iCloud a copy will be available on your iPad as well. Of course moving the documents to you iPad obviates the whole point of the cloud but it can be a more secure option to keep them on your own device.

Sorry but asll I can do is add to the tale of woes.

Yesterday, I upgraded my Mac to Mavericks. I had to as Pages on my iPad had upgraded itself (the only new feature seems to be a new icon) and then told me that if I wanted to open a Pages document on my Mac as well then I would need to upgrade to Mavericks. Well, as it was free, what the heck...

Today, I'm sat in a coffee shop working on a document and...."This document has been deleted from another location" flashed up and right before my eyes the document I was working on vanished. I spent the next couple of hours Googling for solutions, only to find lots of upset posts. I don't know if it was anything to do with Mavericks, after synching with my iPad last night, the iCloud disappearances is not the onloy thing to go wrong with my iPad.

Bye bye iCloud. Because all it takes is ONE error like this to completely undermine my faith in this cloud solution. And bye bye Pages because I've got to use iCloud to get my work on to my Mac, and I don't know if it will devour the documents en route. I had already decided not to use the Key Chain on iCloud as I didn't want the NSA to get all my passwords and credit card details, but now it seems that iCloud might eat those details anyway.

The old Apple adage 'it just works' needs a big upgrade.

"Wellcome". I think it delayed more than a year, that Apple could at least improving icloud adding a "trash/restore" option!! You are not the fst, the only one, And sad, BUT you'nt be the last!

I'll give one trick, that worked for me: if, And Thats the only option, if you have recently backed up your Apple, using time machine, so you can access the time machine drive, inside that, look for the icloud folder (Google it) And your last vers. Of these documents should be there.

BUT it is rally shame on apple's icloud. Extremely dangerous issue.

Just add a trash folder, even if it'd be online, ok... "Acidentaly" erases, could be solved...

I discovered my problem! In my Settings on the iPad, I discovered under ICloud, there is a control switch for "Documents & Data." For some reason, it was turned off. When I slid it to the Green position and re-opened Pages, I was asked if I wanted to synch with iCloud. When I said "yes," my docs reappeared!

Is it fixed for good? I don't know. But it looks OK for now.