Backups and Project Files

Daily backups

On Mac and iPad, Five Rooms backs up each project that has changed, once a day. Backups are kept for 14 days, and the latest backup of every project is always kept. They're stored in a "Backups" folder beside your library. On Mac, Time Machine includes them.

Settings > Backups turns Back up projects every day off or on, backs up now, lists the backups to Restore, and on Mac shows the folder in the Finder. An iPhone makes no backups but can restore the ones your other devices made.

Restoring never overwrites

Restoring a backup merges it into your project. It brings back scenes, text and history you've lost, and it keeps everything you've written since. You can restore an old backup without risk.

Export a project

Choose File > Export Project… (⌥⌘E; on iPad and iPhone, in the ⋯ or + menu) to save a .writingsuite file. It contains the project's full history and checkpoints, its attachments, and a plain-text copy of every document, so it can be read without Five Rooms.

To import one, choose File > Import > Five Rooms Package… (on iPad and iPhone, Import in the Library's menu), or open the file. If the project is already in your library, the file is merged in: nothing is removed.

On Mac, press Space on a .writingsuite file in the Finder to preview it.

Rename, duplicate or delete a project

Control-click a project in the Library (touch and hold on iPad and iPhone), or use the File menu on Mac and the ⋯ or + menu on iPad and iPhone.

Rename Project… gives the project a new title. Your other devices show it once they sync, and a plain-text mirror renames its folder.

Duplicate Project makes a complete, separate copy named "… copy": every document, note, comment and attachment, with its history and checkpoints. The copy isn't linked to the original's Scrivener or Word file, so re-importing still updates the original. Nor is it linked to the original's Storyteller Workbench manuscript or to checkpoints you've shared for review.

Delete Project… removes the project from this device and from iCloud. Your other devices remove it when they next sync, keeping a backup of their own first. Before anything is deleted, a final backup is saved. It stays in Settings > Backups until you remove it, so Restore brings the project back whole. If that backup can't be made, the project isn't deleted.

Compact a project's history

Five Rooms keeps every change you make, so a long-running project's history grows. To trim it, choose Compact History… from the project's menu in the Library (on a Mac, also Project ▸ Compact History…). It's for Mac and iPad; an iPhone takes the compacted history from them.

Every checkpoint and comment is kept, and every change from the last 90 days. Older history is kept hour by hour, and after a year day by day. Documents open in the editor are left for next time, and a document is only compacted if that makes it noticeably smaller.

Your other devices take the compacted version when they next sync. Anything written on them that hadn't synced yet is merged in, not lost. The original history stays on this device, in the library's Epoch Archive folder.