Hi all,
I'm hoping someone can help me solve this problem. I spent a good few hours working on a PDF in Preview on a MacBook Pro with Catalina OS recently updated. I made comments in text boxes, highlights using the built-in mark-up tool, and other annotations. I worked on the file throughout the day, obsessively saving every couple of minutes to avoid exactly this kind of problem. In any case, when I opened the file after lunch, everything was still there. I worked on it again, still there. Put the Mac into locked screen mode a few times in between, still there.
Then, when I wanted to send the finished file off via email, it had either deleted or is not showing my annotations, except for a random handful scattered across the pages. It also created two versions of the file, one that is close to the original size of the PDF without annotations, and one that is showing the handful of annotations. This one is about 3.3MB instead of 336KB, so I assume that it still holds my work somehow, but that Preview is just not showing the annotations. Anyway, I tried opening the document with a few different PDF viewers -- no luck. I looked through the version history, and every file looks identical. I tried sending the file to two different colleagues, each of which cannot see the annotations (except for the scattered few), but they do see the larger file size. I tried the good old standby of restarting -- no luck.
Apple tech support could only recommend re-installing the OS, but I don't see how this could solve the problem. I would really like to recover the annotations rather than having to do it all over again (since it won't be the same as the first time around). Any help greatly appreciated!
I'm hoping someone can help me solve this problem. I spent a good few hours working on a PDF in Preview on a MacBook Pro with Catalina OS recently updated. I made comments in text boxes, highlights using the built-in mark-up tool, and other annotations. I worked on the file throughout the day, obsessively saving every couple of minutes to avoid exactly this kind of problem. In any case, when I opened the file after lunch, everything was still there. I worked on it again, still there. Put the Mac into locked screen mode a few times in between, still there.
Then, when I wanted to send the finished file off via email, it had either deleted or is not showing my annotations, except for a random handful scattered across the pages. It also created two versions of the file, one that is close to the original size of the PDF without annotations, and one that is showing the handful of annotations. This one is about 3.3MB instead of 336KB, so I assume that it still holds my work somehow, but that Preview is just not showing the annotations. Anyway, I tried opening the document with a few different PDF viewers -- no luck. I looked through the version history, and every file looks identical. I tried sending the file to two different colleagues, each of which cannot see the annotations (except for the scattered few), but they do see the larger file size. I tried the good old standby of restarting -- no luck.
Apple tech support could only recommend re-installing the OS, but I don't see how this could solve the problem. I would really like to recover the annotations rather than having to do it all over again (since it won't be the same as the first time around). Any help greatly appreciated!