Causes and solutions for damaged Screenwriter documents (.mmsw) on Windows

SOME THINGS THAT CAN CAUSE A DAMAGED SCRIPT DOCUMENT:

• Accidentally opening the .mmsw document in another program, such as another word processor, and accidentally saving over the .mmsw document.
• Attempting to Print to PDF and clicking on the name of the .mmsw document, which can result in overwriting the .mmsw document.
• Running very low on hard disk space (like less than 10 GB of available hard disk space).  This is a danger to all sorts of programs, not just Screenwriter.
• Trying to edit and save the .mmsw document onto a cloud-based drive or in a cloud-based folder.
• Shutting down the system or powering it down before Windows has had the opportunity to flush its file caches.
• Writing to a location where you don't have the proper write privileges, or not running from an Administrator account.
• In Screenwriter's Startup/Files options, setting the Default Documents Folder, or the Timed Backup Folder, or the "Place Previous Version Files in:" path options to something not on your main hard disk, or on a removable volume like a USB drive, or a cloud-synced drive.
• Your file system on your hard disk is developing disk errors or other directory damage.
• Anti-Virus or Anti-Malware programs interactively prevent the writing of the .mmsw document while it is being saved.

SOLUTIONS FOR A DAMAGED .mmsw SCRIPT DOCUMENT:

1. First and foremost, recover the latest .BK file.  This will be a file of the SAME NAME as the .mmsw script document you are having problems opening.  It will be located in a folder called "Previous Documents".  That folder can be in many places, and there may be multiple copies, but generally it is a folder located in the same place as the document you are having problems opening.
2. Once you have located the most recent copy of your document with a .BK extension, make a COPY of it (in the Windows File Explorer) by either using the Copy / Paste command or by alt-dragging it from its location to a new location.
3. RENAME the .BK extension to .mmsw.
4. You should be able to open that document using Movie Magic Screenwriter.
5. Instead of using a .BK backup, you could restore any external copy / backup of the .mmsw script document.

Tag: Movie Magic Screenwriter 6, Windows