Sync Caused Bookmarks to Disappear

onthehunt

onthehunt

I have Opera dev. version synced with my home laptop and my desktop so information is the same. I use a laptop at work and have Opera installed on it. I thought it would be a good idea to sync that laptop with my other 2 computers. BIG MISTAKE!! When I came home, Opera on my home laptop and desktop have now synced with my work laptop, and I lost all of my bookmarks!! My work computer now shows only my work laptop which are very minimal. How can I get back my home bookmarks again? If I can't, I'm through with Opera. Thank you.

blackbird71

blackbird71

FWIW, any sync program/feature should never be viewed as a backup mechanism for personal data or settings - though many users do exactly that. One should always have solid backup media, with backups for each system repeated periodically (as often as necessary to be satisfied that a user can 'get back home' closely enough to be effective for useful recovery). There are simply way too many things that can and do go awry with synchronizing systems, particularly where multiple user systems are involved. I realize this doesn't "fix" your present problem, but going forward in whatever way you ultimately decide to, it's a good thing to keep in mind.

I've found that, regardless of browser brand or syncing system, having at least a separate copy of the user data/settings files for each browser has been invaluable for issues like this. In my case, I simply keep a copy of the entire user-account files for each browser, just for simplicity, and those are backed-up every few days using an automatic batch file.

A Former User

Black, if one backs that up automatically and will still use synchronising, it can happen some backups would be overwritten the same way as here in question.
Just to be clear.

blackbird71

blackbird71

Black, if one backs that up automatically and will still use synchronising, it can happen some backups would be overwritten the same way as here in question.
Just to be clear.

Indeed, if I understand you correctly. However, the backup file itself would still preserve the data that was current at it's creation/update date, so it could still be re-restored. As such, a backup represents only a source for getting a particular system's data/settings safely 'back home' to the date of the backup file. But, of course, it would require the user to make sure 'sync' was shut off for that system to prevent the restored data from being over-written by a faulty sync record, until the sync record base could be correctly updated from the restored system and until one could make sure the entire sync system was operating correctly.

My comment was intended only to suggest a data backup mechanism always be kept in place and reasonably current for 'getting home', and wasn't intended as an analysis for what went wrong (or may remain wrong) with the sync process itself. The harsh life-reality is that something will almost always eventually go wrong with syncing systems, and it is wise to never consider sync or its other netted computers as a kind of backup scheme in case data gets lost on one of the netted systems. Syncing, by its inherent nature, can automatically propagate an individual system's data loss to every one of the netted systems, if either the user or the sync system makes a miscue.