I hired a tech from an IT support company to service our computers. It was a disaster. Among many problems he caused, I just discovered that he ran some cleanup utility, probably CCleaner, which reset the Recent Documents list in Word and Excel.



Is there any way to restore it? It's not the end of the world, of course, but I had quite a few documents "pinned" so I could get to them quickly.

Hi jennifer,

Not unless you've backep up the Windows Registry and you're prepared to restore that (could be a dodgy proposition).

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

That's what I was afraid of.

It seems odd to me that a cleanup utility would clear out the recent docs list. They are saving at most 500 bytes, no?

It seems to me that these "cleanup" utilities should do a much better job of informing the user about what they are cleaning up and offering a task-by-task opt out option.

Thanks

I agree CCleaner etc over-do the job. If they're peremptorily cleaning out the MRUs for installed programs, who knows what else they're cleaning out that should be left alone.

In this case, though, the 'hired tech' is really to blame. They shouldn't have done this without asking permission and without explaining the consequences - which they had a responsibility to be fully aware of beforehand.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Grrr... Yes, of course. But that wasn't the worst of it. He also disabled a number of startup apps, several of which I didn't discover for a day or two. But the company came highly recommended by several people, so I called to complain. The guy admitted that he disabled any startup app that he didn't recognize. One of them was the program that controls the touchpad. When I asked the owners, they said that it is not possible to know everything that the cleanup utilities do or what every startup app does, so some breakage is to be expected.

I'm still fuming.

Not good enough. They're just trying to pass the buck. If they're using an app on your system they have a legal responsibility to know what it does. In any event, they shouldn't have made any changes you didn't authuorize. Simply disabling startup apps they didn't recognize shows their incompetence.

I'd suggest disputing any charges they might have made for 'services rendered'.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

CCleaner gives the person running it the choice of whether or not to clear out the recent docs list. I identified the setting here:
https://www.msofficeforums.com/excel...ents-list.html

The hired tech should know this and should have checked with the end users whether or not the recent docs list should be retained before running the tool.

The workman and not the tool is to blame here.

This is really upsetting. I hate these situations when you are wronged, but the corporation says it's not their fault, they are not responsible for knowing everything they use. Say What??? Their employee is to blame here, and they should accept responsibility for him, or at least take some disciplinary action against him.

You might contact CCleaner and see if there is a data recovery file available that they could send you.

I didn't think of that. It probably did save a restore file. I have mostly recreated it manually now.

CCleaner would only save a restore file if the user told it to (IIRC it is one of the available options). However, it seems unlikely the same cowboy who stuffed your system up would have done that and, in any event, using it even an hour later (ie after you've made other changes) could have adverse effects.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Yep, I'm afraid you're right. I'll just chalk it up to a lesson learned.