Guest mode deletes all work!

[vjaaan]

My son just bought new 27" iMac. I logged on in Guest mode when he was finished. Later he woke up the computer and started working. It did not ask him to log in or mention it was still in Guest mode. He spent hours making a movie in iMovie, uploading photos, etc. Just after he logged off, I thought to mention I had been using Guest mode and I just read that all work would be deleted when logging off.
Sure enough, his whole afternoon's work was gone. He could not find it in either Guest mode or when properly logged on.
Is there any way to retrieve this? There was no warning to him at any point that he was in Guest mode or that his work would be deleted.

 

[Toutou]

I'm sorry to say that, but that's the purpose of Guest mode. It (intentionally) deletes everything so there are no traces left.

 

[Nermal]

Unfortunately, as noted, that's the purpose of guest mode; it's a system for "one-off" use that doesn't make any lasting changes to the system. If this is likely to be a problem in the future then there are a couple of options. You could set the system to require logging in after sleep (so that you don't accidentally end up in the guest account), or you could disable guest mode entirely and create a "generic" account for guests that doesn't auto-delete on logoff.

Does anyone know whether the guest account is backed up in Time Machine? I wonder whether it may be possible to recover something that way, but I have no experience with it myself so please don't get your hopes up.

 

[DeltaMac]

Yes, guest user is designed to be a temporary access account, so it worked as expected.
OTOH, your son should have noticed that window "All work will be deleted when you log out" that always appears when you log out of guest mode.
You may want to disable the guest user so this doesn't happen again.

 

[chscag]

Is there any way to retrieve this? There was no warning to him at any point that he was in Guest mode or that his work would be deleted.

There may be a way, however, advise your son to stop using the machine for fear of overwriting the deleted guest account data. Data recovery software may be able to restore the movie. Data Rescue 4 or Disk Drill might work. They both have trial versions you can test with before buying.