Blog: WhizFolders, Articles and tips

These things do happen, and that’s why we have an all automated web site just for this purpose at support.whizfolders.com. Please login there with your contact email address that is on our file, and you should be able to get the latest installer download along with the license codes. This facility is free of charge for a period of two years after your original purchase. After that the facility is renewed once you buy an upgrade.

This takes care of installing WhizFolders. What about your documents? You should have kept a backup copy of all your .wzfolder files by using simple copy from Windows Explorer. WhizFolders also includes a simple backup feature that allows you to copy a document to a safe location from time to time. Whatever method you choose, you are alone responsible for keeping a safe copy of your documents.

When you reinstall WhizFolders on a new machine, put your documents in a documents folder of your choice using Windows Explorer so that you remember where you have them. Then, just double-click on a document name to open it in WhizFolders and it appears in the main window list. Do that for all your documents. Or, add them all at once by the right-click menu operation “Add an existing document to List…” You are all set to go. Don’t forget to continue keeping a backup copy of the documents in case it happens again. We can help if you lost WhizFolders but we can’t help you get back your documents.

On any computer system, a data loss or corruption can occur due to any reason–hardware or software problems, viruses, etc. You must take a backup of all your documents. This is true not only of WhizFolders documents but all types of documents made with other applications. It doesn’t matter what backup tool you use to keep a safe copy of your documents.

A simple copy is enough: Previously, when disk space was expensive and backup mediums like ZIP disks were smaller, we needed special backup tools that “compressed” the backup size and only backed up what was changed. Today you don’t need all that complexity because extra disk space is really cheap and the backup mediums like DVDs can keep huge number of files. So even simple copying of files to another hard disk by using Windows Explorer can save you much trouble when the time comes to restore a corrupted document file.

Like any other document files, WhizFolder document (.wzfolder) files can be copied to a safe place too by using Windows Explorer. Then you can always copy them back in case of a disaster. No special software is needed. In WhizFolders, we have extended this “simple” copy feature so that WhizFolders can do multiple copies of a document for you to a target backup folder. You can set up a backup folder so that when you use the Backup feature in WhizFolders, it will copy your documents to that backup folder. A backup button is provided on the document window, and you can also set up a document to do the backup copy automatically when a document is closed. This way, you can recover your documents from an earlier copy in case of a corruption.

WhizFolders backup is a simple file copy operation: In WhizFolders, a Backup is simply a copy of the document with a different name. To reuse such a copy in case of a document corruption, you just need to copy it back to your documents folder. A backup copy has a date and time appended to its name so you just need to rename it to the original document name before using it. That’s it. There is no need to do some kind of import or restore operation from the backup folder in order to use the copy. In fact, you can go to the backup folder and directly open a document copy to look at it. We keep things simple.

Setting up the backup folder: You can set it up on the Main Window menu “Tools–Backup Options.” WhizFolders will ask you to set it up anyway when you go to do your first backup.

In the above picture of Backup Options, the folder “G:\Mybackups” is set as the back up folder.

There is a second option “Number of document copy names to reuse every day.” I will explain it in a minute. For now I select the value 3 for it.

First you need to understand how the backup takes place. OK. So I select the above backup folder and click on Apply. Now WhizFolders remembers G:\Mybackups as the backup folder.

Backing up a document: Once I set up the Backup folder, all I need to do is, hit the Backup button on the document window, or use the Save and Backup operation on the File menu. As soon as I do that, WhizFolders saves and copies that document to the backup folder. Actually WhizFolders copies it by the same file name but appends the date and a number to that name.

For example, here is a message WhizFolders shows after performing the backup: “File copied successfully to G:\Mybackups\Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 2.wzfolder” Notice how it made up that name. The name starts with “Backup” followed by the document name “My notes” and then the date “20 Dec 07” and finally 2 to show that it is the second backup copy of that document on that date.

Now you will understand the meaning of that second option “Number of document copy names to reuse every day” in the above picture. If I make its value 0 then on each backup a fresh copy will be created. Since I selected 3 for the value, it will create copies by the following names:

1. Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 1.wzfolder
2. Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 2.wzfolder
3. Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 3.wzfolder

If I do another backup operation on that day, the oldest document copy “Backup My notes 20 Dec 07, 1.wzfolder” will be overwritten because WhizFolders will reuse that copy name. So I will always have last 3 backed up copies of a document on that day.

If you want automatic backup operation whenever a document is closed, you can set that up on the File Options–Backup page of that document.

There is another option there that also allows you to save an RTF copy of the document at the same time. Use it only for small documents as it will make the backup operation slow.

What if I want to see the contents of the backup folder to explore some old copies? You can do that by going to that folder in Windows Explorer. For example, in this case, I can open G:\Mybackups in Windows Explorer to see its contents. For this purpose, WhizFolders also gives a quick “Open Backup Folder in Explorer” menu on the Tools menu of its main window.

Important Note: Note that I can directly open a backup copy of the document in WhizFolders but it won’t appear in the main window list because WhizFolders treats the backup folder as not a “regular use” folder.

Don’t do this: For the reason given above, please do not set up one of your regular document folders as a Backup folder. It makes no sense. If you do this then any files opened from that folder will not appear in the main window list.

Question: Can I keep all of my notes on two computers? How is that accomplished?

The WhizFolder document files (.wzfolder) are like any other documents that you can copy to any computer and use them there. You need to install WhizFolders on both the computers. Our single-user license allows you to use WhizFolders on many computers provided you are the only user.

But if you are talking about Synchronizing your notes, that is not possible yet. In that case, you are better off keeping the notes on a portable USB drive. But remember, USB writes are not reliable and the documents can get corrupted. Hence, it is better to keep regular backup copies of your notes.

WhizFolders now has an in-built backup feature that allows you to keep multiple copies of a document in a backup folder. A backup button is provided, and you can also set it up to backup automatically when a document is closed. You can set up a backup folder on each computer so that when you use the Backup feature in WhizFolders, it will copy your documents from the USB drive to your preferred backup folder on that computer. This way, you can recover your data from either PC in case of a corruption.

If you prefer, you can also use Windows Explorer or any other software tool to copy your files to a safe backup destination. The WhizFolder documents (.wzfolder) are like any other files and can be copied easily. Each .wzfolder file keeps many of your notes inside it. There are no other file types involved.

This happens when you have this .wzfolder document file marked as read-only in the file system. Note the document location at the top. Open Windows Explorer and go to that folder. Select the .wzfolder document file and right-click to see the properties. Uncheck the Read Only attribute and you are all set to be able to edit it again in WhizFolders.

If the above properties shows that Read Only is already off then the reason might be that this file is already opened by another application or another user on the network. For example, if someone is viewing it with WhizFolder Viewer, WhizFolders will automatically open it Read Only.

Question: I use Whizfolders and love it. My problem is that I can have it either at home or at work. My home computer is a desktop and the work computer is a laptop. At the moment my Whizfolders is on my home computer and I have an evaluation copy on my laptop. It is invaluable and as a teacher, I do most of the work at home but need to access all the ideas and plans at work. Is there a way to do this or do I have to purchase another copy? If I do this, how can I share the folders between both computers or copy them across?

As for your first question, no, you don’t need to purchase a second copy. You can use your license on the laptop too as long as you are the only user using it on both machines. Just download a paid version installer from the special web site support.whizfolders.com and use it on the laptop to install.

Your second question: You can copy your .wzfolder document files to the laptop to use them at work. But, you will have to remember to update a file from one computer to another when you make changes. There is no automated syncing available for that.

If you do not understand where the document files are and how to copy them, please see the sections, Document Locations and Managing Documents to understand them better.

Sharing the documents over LAN or through USB, Flash drives: You may also decide to keep the documents always on the laptop and use them over the LAN from your desktop. If you do that, remember that LAN writes are not very reliable in Windows and there might be a data loss at times if the data is not flushed out properly. Same thing is true when you use flash or USB drives. In both these cases, you must take regular backups of your documents.

Use the new Backup feature: In any case, it would be a good idea to use the backup feature in the new WhizFolders to keep a regular backup copy of your documents, both at work and at home. It allows you to even keep multiple copies of a document, separate for each day.

Question: How do I set the default location for the notes, to a specified location (like c:\notes\)? At present, they are placed in “My Documents” unless I make special effort to move them.

There is nothing like a default location but a starting location. The first time location (after you start Windows) is controlled by the desktop shortcut from which you start WhizFolders. This is set up as My Documents in Start In box. But you can always change it in the shortcut by right-clicking on it.

Subsequently, WhizFolders uses a last-used-folder strategy. As soon as you open a document from another location, it remembers that as the working location for the next File New or Open operations. This is quite convenient once you know how it works. So if you are planning on using a particular location for all your documents, change the desktop shortcut, and move all your existing documents there so that the working location remains same through out.

Moving your existing documents: This needs some explanation so I am answering it in another article, Moving your existing documents.

Please also see the article Document Locations under Concepts to better understand the document files and locations.

Before we discuss this, do you know that your WhizFolder documents are separate files on your disk? If you understand this concept, please read this article. Otherwise, first read the concept, Where does WhizFolders keep my notes?.

When you create a new document, WhizFolders always asks you for a file name. It selects the location My Documents by default but there is no reason why you can’t change it. If you have not been paying attention, perhaps, all your documents are ending up in My Documents. While this is convenient to remember, it has its disadvantages as discussed in The pitfalls of using “My Documents” as the location of your documents.

Once you know this, you might want to move over all your documents to a new location. Here are some tips on moving them. Depending on your feedback, I want to make these tips better and can even think of introducing file operations in WhizFolders. Lately, I have come to realize that using Windows Explorer and the file system is not easy for many of you.

Tips for moving your documents:

Simple case: I am assuming a simple case where you have determined that all your documents are in My Documents and you want to move them.

1. Make sure that WhizFolders is not running or does not have any documents open.
2. Open My Documents in Windows Explorer
3. Make sure that you are seeing the list in details mode (View–Details menu)
4. Click on the column heading “Type” so that all WhizFolder documents appear together in the list.
5. Select them all using standard Explorer methods.
6. Right-click and Copy to clipboard. (don’t use Cut because in case of errors during copy, you don’t want to be in a state where some documents have moved and some have not. Using Copy ensures that the process is repeatable after some error)
7. Go to the desired target folder in Explorer where you want to put the documents.
8. Right-click in the folder contents (right-pane) and do a paste.
9. A Windows Copy operation starts. If there are any errors (for example, if the document is open in WhizFolders or there is not enough disk space), correct the situation and try a paste again.
10. Once you are sure that all the documents are copied properly, you can now update the WhizFolders main document list. Here are the steps.
    1. Start WhizFolders and click on the main window to see the list.
    2. Edit–Select all to select all the document names in the list. These are pointing to the old location.
    3. Right-click and do “Remove from List.” This merely removes the old location document name entries from the list.
    4. Right-click and do “Add an existing document.” A file open dialog comes up. Go to your new folder where you copied all your documents above. Select all those document names in the file open dialog and then click open.
    5. Your list is now updated to point to the new location. Open a few documents from the list to see that the new documents are opening correctly.
11. Once you have updated and verified the main list as described above, you can now take a safe backup copy of your old documents in My Documents and then delete them.

Not so simple case:? What if your documents are scattered over several file system folders and you want to move them all to one place?

For this, Windows Search Files operation can be useful. Just start a Windows Search (Start–Search for Files and Folders), click on All Files and Folders, and enter *.wzfolder in the filename. Change the Look In box if necessary, then start the Search. It might take some time depending on how many disks it is searching.

Finally, you will get a complete list of your WhizFolder documents in the right-pane. After that the steps to copy are essentially the same as from Step 5 above.

Yet another method to copy: If you know and understand how Backup works in the new version, you can select all the documents in the main window list and do a backup to a fresh folder. This copies all the documents in one-shot. Then you can go and correct the names of the copied documents because the names have some date suffixes in them. We will give an option for a straight copy in some future version. However, note that this method will only copy the documents in your list. If your list is not complete, you still have to rely on Windows Search as described above.