Unzipped Outlook attachment and saved over newer version? Trying to recover

Question

Teammate sent me a packaged workbook via outlook. I must have opened it instead of save as. Made a lot of changes. Thought I was sending back but I think the version Outlook was suggesting was not the new version  and I inadvertently sent back the original version. Before I realized that, I went to the email i sent to open it, which required me to extract / unzip,  noticed it was the original version not mine.  I am thinking that since I inadvertently sent back the original, it unzipped over my newer version. I have looked in Autosave folder, used a directory tool on my machine, everything I can think of. Lesson learned to Save As at a minimum but nay ideas to save me from hours of re-work? Would greatly appreciate it.

MemphLantAntonio · Answer

Thanks! I think I may not have been as specific on this. I think the issue is it is an Alteryx package. So It prompts "do you want to import", the destination directory defaults to within my outlook folder and is the same folder ever time named for the workflow, i click yes, it says "this folder contains files, do you want to overwrite"? I dumbly clicked "yes" in haste

The .bak idea is interesting, will try

KGT · Answer

Also, in that folder, select to show hidden files and look for a .bak. Rename it to .yxmd and see whether that gets you anywhere.

KGT · Answer

OK, so a couple of things here:

* Using Outlook client, when you open an attachment, I would expect it to unzip to a temporary directory, and I would expect that temporary directory to be different every time.
* Using Outlook on Web, no idea, maybe it goes to download folder and so may go over the top, but this would surely have warnings such as what @OTrieger mentioned.

Before doing too much, try your recent files as well... that might have a more direct link. Working under the premise that the different files exist somewhere, as I can't think of a situation that would allow files to be overwritten without asking.

Under File > Open Workflow > Open Autorecovered files, you can select all files from the day in question plus a day either side and open them. This may hang your computer for a little, but it also may provide you with a version that has at least some of the changes. I believe that when you save a file and then exit out, it is no longer seen as needed in this list, but I don't know that for sure.

My Autosave files are under C:\Users\<UserProfile>\AppData\Local\Alteryx\Autosave and there is a text file in there that lists them as well.