iCloud deleted my documents. How do I get them back

I don't think you'll find the Mobile Documents folder in Snow Leopard.

The Mobile Documents folder is the local iCloud sync folder. I will only contain something if you set up iCloud Document syncing on your Mac. To do that, you'll need Lion.

Thus, you won't find this folder on Snow Leopard as you cannot configure iCloud on Snow Leopard. You can only use your web browser to access iCloud in the internet.

I guess you also won't find this folder (or maybe only empty) on Lion unless you have configured iCloud on your Mac.

Hallo there

what about windows users? What can I do to get my docs back?

Good news: they worked on this issue. I have received an e-mail from the iWork Team it's fixed. I haven't had any loss since the weekend. Let's hope it won't happen again. So far it looks good.

Still, don't forget to make backup copies of your important documents elsewhere...

Hi GVDE,

I suppose that is good news that they have fixed the issue, but can they do anything for us who have lost documents. Thanks for your email of earlier today, however:

1. I have Lion (OS 10.7.2) and,

2. I did configure iCloud for my iMac. All I did was check the boxes for Contacts, Calendars, Bookmarks, Documents and Data and Back to my Mac (whatever that is.)

I still do not see any MobileDocuments Folder in my Library.

Any other ways you can think of to recover the documents that use to show in Pages on my iPad2?

Thanks,

Peter Feer

If you have checked documents in iClouds on your Mac documents should have been synced to your computer. If you don't see any "Mobile Documents" folder this seems odd. I think there must be one if you enabled iCloud & Documents on your Mac.

Are you sure you look in the right place?

Do you use the same account on your Mac? (i.e. you don't have a second administrative user account on your Mac in which you have configured iCloud instead). iClouds preference settings apply per user account (except Find my Mac...).

Do you see your contacts, calendars etc. in AddressBook, iCal, etc. on your Mac? Are these synced with your iPad?

I suggest, you open a Terminal window. Enter "ls ~/Library" without the quotes. Check if there is any "Mobile Documents" folder. If in doubt post the listing you get in your next response.

I have found the library, and I have found the mobile documents folders, but they are, unfortunately, empty.

My guess is that is because I have iWork on iPad and iPhone, but not on my mac, so there would be no reason for it to store copies on my harddrive.

I'm quite surprised that there isn't a backup function on iCloud so that copies whatever files being deleted into a server where it can be retrieved within, say the last week... That function would sure come in handy now, and in the future, for those who, by mistake, erase a file.

Of course it is empty. The "Mobile Documents" folder is the mirror from iCloud. The important folders are the old versions which are named "Mobile Documents.delete.<date>". Those should contain the last synced version before the files disappeared in iCloud.

Files are synced if you have enabled Documents in iClouds preferences. If you have enabled that before documents were lost and the documents were in iCloud at that time, your Mac should have downloaded a copy into the Mobile Documents folder and then renamed the folder to "Mobile Documents.delete" next time when it found files disappeared in iCloud.

Here are the folders - maybe I'm stupid, but I do not see the folder you're talking about...

Did you enable Documents sync in iCloud preferences?

When did you configure iCloud on your Mac?

When did you enable iCloud & Documents sync in iCloud preferences?

Did you configure it before you have lost your documents?

What is the exact creation date of the Mobile Documents folder and the three iWorks folders inside?

Hi Felix,

Thanks for this... After trying everything else on these threads this is the first solution that seems to work.

Felix Leiter wrote:

I seem to have resolved the issue with a little help from Applecare, proceeding as follows:

1) Backup all of your iPad and/or iPhone data through iTunes;

2) click off the "Sync Apps" button in iTunes and perform a "clean" sync of the device (all third party apps will disappear, as well as iWork apps);

3) Connect to the Appstore on iPad/iPhone and download your apps back, STARTING WITH IWORK APPS;

4) Sync back again with iTunes.

After taking these steps, documents in the cloud appears to have resumed regular syncing with no deletions, I will keep everyone posted as to how this solution stands, however it seems to be a conflict between iWork apps and other third party apps. If true, it's hard to believe someone at Apple hasn't posted this workaround somewhere yet. If this workaround is only temporary, let's hope Apple fixes it soon.

But it's worth trying, no more deletes here!

No deletes yet, 16 hours and counting...

Felix,

Does the process you outlined in "I seem to have resolved the issue with a little..." work to RECOVER the lost Pages and Numbers documents OR does this just resolve the issue of continuing to lose documents and spreadsheets? I am just looking to RECOVER what was lost.

Thanks,

Peter

Hi gvde,

Thanks for your help with this...

First, I am pretty sure I am looking in the right place. I went to Finder, held down the option key, and up popped "Library" in the dropdown window. That is where I am looking. It just skips from MailDownloads to Preferences, no MobileDocuments. I would like to look using a Terminal Window. How do I open one?

So, for my iMac, in my contacts for Apple, I have the following:

1. An Apple User name, which is my gmail address, with a password.

2. An Apple ID for Apple Store purchases, which is my gmail address with a different password, and

3. An Apple MobileMe UN and Password which is different from the above.

The AppleID that is showing up for me in System Preferences under iCloud on my iMac is my MobileMe UN and password, not my administrative user account. When I check my account settings under iCloud on my iPad, my Account at the very top is number 1 above, meaning my Gmail address. Based on what you've outlined, this may be my problem, yes? How could I resolve this AND if I have to choose one administrative account, which one should I choose that would give me the better chance of having MobileDocuments show up in the Library on my iMac, leading to document recovery?

Thanks,

Peter Feer

I really don't use my contacts and iCal on the iMac and iPad. I use gmail, so I have the iMac and iPad syncing with my google ID. A glance at my iCal shows that it is empty, so I am not syncing with it at all.

GVDE,

One more thing... I don't have iWorks software installed on my iMac. Pages and Numbers just show up as apps within iTunes.

Cheers,

Peter

Gvde,

Good news! So, I signed out of my iMac iCloud account and then re-signed up using the User Name and Password that match my iPad iCloud account. Lo and behold, then when I went into iCloud Storage on my Mac, there were my lost documents in the Pages folder, named as -tef files.

So, now the trick is to restore those somehow from iCloud and get them into Word docs, so I don't lose them again.

Can you help me with this?

Cheers,

Peter Feer

Gvde,

So, did a little research on the web and found a solution.

Went to www.icloud.com/iwork on the Internet, signed out - as it still had me signed in as my original UN and PW from mobileme. Signed in with the iCloud UN and PW on my iPad and - yep - there in the iWorks Pages program were my lost docs. I was able to download them as Word docs and save them in the appropriate folders on my backup disk. Still have not figured out how to get them back to Pages on my iPad, but they are not lost.

Thanks for all your help.

Best,

Peter Feer