Ok. Can someone explain to me where to find the auto-save files on Mac? The only thing I seem to be able to find are some .xml files buried in the temp folder.
Once we have that settled…I understand that when layout closes properly (or successfully saves), the temp folder is emptied. Is that when the program itself closes? Or the file associated with the files?
Example:
Layout crashes
Upon reopening the file that crashed, no recovered file option is shown and the file opens in the last state it was saved.
the auto-save files are somewhere…what are the next steps to recover them?
On Mac, it stores them in a working directory while they’re open: ~/Library/Application Support/SketchUp 2025/LayOut/working
The temporary files use the standard way of creating temp files that Apple provides resources for all apps, in /var/folders/. You can use the find command in Terminal to find things in there, but again, that may go away.
The auto-backups on Mac will set by time from Preferences->Backup and defaults to 5 minutes.
The general structure of a LayOut file is a zipped file with some .xml files for general document and page layout, and a ref/ and page/ directory for references (models, images and other things added) and for each page in your document.
You can unzip a .layout file to see, and to turn it back into a zipped layout file, zip/compress it from inside the directory that contains .xml and ref/ and pages/ directories, NOT from the level of the folder that they’re in. In Finder, select all the .xml files and ref/ and pages/ folders and control/right click and select Compress. From the command line, man zip is the manual page.