Lost all my tasks on bitcomet!!!

BitComet BitComet General Discussion
1

Hello,

I just opened bitcomet and got the following error message…

Failed to load task list! Please try to restore from bak file. (C;\Users\James\AppData\Roaming.…\Downloads.xml)

For one thing I can’t find the file and secondly would not know what to do with it if I did!!! I also went to torrent history and nothing in the list after April this year.

I had just last week downloaded a HEAP of stuff and didn’t get around to moving them to the pc yet as moving house.

I’m thinking this is not able to be recovered but if someone out there could solve my problem I would be eternally grateful!

Thanks in advance just for reading this. I am clueless with this stuff.

James.

2

There will be upto 10 “. bak” files named “downloads(date of backup).xml.bak”, just rename the one with the latest date to “downloads.xml” while bitcomet is shut down and it will restore bitcomet’s download list to the date of that backup.

Each time you shut down bitcomet makes a new backup version of this file and saves the ten most recent so you’ll need to select a date from before this problem occurred.

You may have to change your folder options to display “hidden/system” files in order to browse to the files, or you can try copying…

%appdata%

to the address bar on any folder then look for the bitcomet folder.

This type of error is usually caused when windows is shut down before bitcomet is fully shut down. If you are running a lot of tasks and your computer is being overworked it can take a few minutes to properly shut down. Also make sure you are properly shutting down bitcomet rather than just minimizing it. This should prevent a recurrence of this problem.

Alternately you can simply restart each task from the original torrent and as each torrent rehashes it will continue from it’s previous state of completion.

3

wow sounds complex to the novice!

you said about tasks and restarting- well all tasks have disappeared completely so I have a bare canvas (besides torrent history as previously mentioned but has nothing after April).

my computer didn’t crash etc. i’m thinking this is a deeper problem.

by the way thanks for your help but i cannot locate these bak files. any step by step instructions for a pleb greatly appreciated.

4

did your appdata folder open when you followed my instructions above?

If not then do a google search for the phrase…

enable viewing system files and folders for (your windows version)

While you are changing the folder options also look for an option to “hide file extensions for known file types” and disable that option. Once enabled you shouldn’t have any problem opening the folder and it will be easier to rename the files when you can view the extensions.

ps. This is a very simple problem that all clients have when the computer is shutdown without the client having enough time to close each task. Windows usually allows a couple minutes then will force them to close and if you have many tasks running it can take longer to close them all and save your downloads.xml file before windows deletes it. When it’s no longer present bitcomet will recreate a new blank downloads list.

the proper way to shut down bitcomet is click on “file” then “exit”.

5

Thanks. Very busy been moving house. Will get back to you after I have a chance to try to follow your instructions. Thanks again in advance.

6

Hi,

I tried everything you said getting in through %appdata% and followed instructions changing the names of the bak files (many times) but no cigar.

Oh well start again.

I really appreciate you taking the time to try to help though.

Thanks very much and have a great life.

7

You can read the documentation on the WIKI site here…

http://wiki.bitcomet.com/bitcomet_client_issues_and_possible_solutions#tasks_have_disappeared_deleted_tasks_reappeared_in_my_tasklist_after_a_bitcomet_restart_how_can_i_fix_this

It’s a simple process of renaming a file. Microsoft complicates it by moving the files to making it harder to find them and hiding part of the file name, but I instructed you how to fix that.

Of course as I mentioned before you can simply just restart each of the torrents just like you did the first time and they will continue.

8

topic moved

9

Thanks. I did all that but it didn’t work. If I start all the torrents again I will have to download all again and I don’t have unlimited data at the moment. All good.

On another note downloaded Don Jon yesterday. Well worth a watch if you have a good sense of humour.

10

You won’t have to redownload the data, just restart the torrent.

I’ll check out that movie if I have the time, thanks

11

I have a better solution ! Delete Bitcomet and install uTorrent. Worked for me. I hope it helps

12

I know this is an old topic, but seeing as this is the only one I found, regarding this subject, I thought I’d ask here:

I have the same problem, and when I try to import a *.xml or even a *.bak file, BitComet says "the file is corrupt or not a bc_bak file", but then again, there are no *.bc_bak files! I don't know if there should be, but I can't find any!
13

rename downloads.xml to brokendownloads.xml, then find a backup from the latest date that worked and rename it downloads.xml then start bitcomet.

you may have to enable viewing of file extentions for known file types in order to be able to change the extentions. A google search can be helpful in doing that.
14

Hey, thanks for replying!

Nope, nothing changed. It appears that BC now uses "Downloads.bc_bak" instead of the xml file.

I even tried to trick it, by changing the .xml extensions of older logs, to .bc_bak,  but BC would just say they are corrupted, or not compatible files.
15

change your folder options to allow viewing of known file extensions and everything will become clear.

16

That;s the setting I use by default, due to the nature of my job.

Again, BC is asking for bc_bak files.

I updated to a new version, before my list was lost. Could it be that BC is using a new format now, thus making the old .bak and .xml files obsolete?
17

the instructions I gave you were to fix the problem outside bitcomet

18

read here

  [http://wiki.bitcomet.com/bitcomet_client_issues_and_possible_solutions#tasks_have_disappeared_deleted_tasks_reappeared_in_my_tasklist_after_a_bitcomet_restart_how_can_i_fix_this](http://wiki.bitcomet.com/bitcomet_client_issues_and_possible_solutions#tasks_have_disappeared_deleted_tasks_reappeared_in_my_tasklist_after_a_bitcomet_restart_how_can_i_fix_this)
19

I just got hit by a similar issue. My disk space gone down when backup process caught a directory it was not supposed to archive, and BitComet trashed its own configuration files.

I've managed to recover downloads queue from automatic backups, but configuration itself was irrecoverable lost, as BitComet rewrite it, but do not make backups, nor use safe file replacement techniques.
20

There will be upto 10 “. bak” files named “downloads(date of backup).xml.bak”, just rename the one with the latest date to “downloads.xml” while bitcomet is shut down. Shutdown your PC, after few minutes, restart your PC.

click on your bitcomet and all the task will be displayed.

For windows 10

1. Enable the show hidden files, folders or drives

2. Locate downloads.xml.yyyymmdd in local disk (C:)>user>username>AppData>Roaming>BitComet>

3. Rename downloads.xml.yyyymmdd as downloads.xml

4. Shutdown the PC

5. Restart PC

6. Open Bitcomet and all tasks will be listed.

This worked for me.

Thanks