Today it is very often possible to meet users who, unknowingly or recklessly, accidentally delete files and programs without the possibility of their recovery, and then, as they say, begin to bite their elbows. Let's look at how critical this situation is and find out what a program that can recover deleted programs and files can be.
Basic principles of information recovery
To begin with, there are at least two ways to delete information on Windows operating systems:
- placement in the "Basket" and its subsequent cleaning;
- removal bypassing the "Recycle Bin".
In addition, it completely erases information from the hard drive its formatting.
In the first two cases, if the deletion was performed without using the Recycle Bin or with its cleaning, data recovery is not such a complicated procedure. The fact is that when you delete a file from the OS environment on the hard drive, it does not get erased. It’s just that at the beginning of the name the first letter is changed to the unreadable character “$” (or another). Therefore, the system in the usual sense does not see the object. Almost any program that restores deleted files is based on this . It searches for objects on the hard drive by its name with the “$” symbol at the beginning of the name.
However, this technique only works if the area or sector in which the deleted file is not overwritten. In other words, the maximum possible recovery can be achieved only immediately after an accidental deletion of an object. If, after deletion, the processes of copying (moving) or saving of open documents were performed, there is absolutely no guarantee of the safety of the information to be restored.
Formatting a disk or partition is a little worse. Even in the case of quick formatting, the so-called clearing of the table of contents is performed, and a search by name with an initial character becomes impossible. In such a situation, extreme measures will have to be applied, which will be discussed a little later.
User uninstalled the program: how to restore the application?
In general, a lot of problems can be associated with recovery. Nevertheless, one of the easiest ways is to use specialized utilities, usually called Unerase (-r) or Undelete.
Some optimizer programs also contain modules that allow you to recover lost information. During installation, they embed their own commands in the "Recycle Bin" menu and allow data recovery in a couple of clicks.
What will be used in each case (a program that recovers deleted programs and files, or a specialized optimizer application module) does not play a special role. All the same, the principle is the same.
Misconceptions regarding the recovery of programs and files
Unfortunately, there is a widespread belief among users that recovering an application and a file is one and the same thing. Nothing like this. For example, a girl uninstalled a program on a computer. How to recover files, she, maybe, also knows, the benefit on the Internet of councils is enough. It launches the simplest file recovery utility and ... That's where the problems begin.
It is one thing to find the file you need, and another is to restore entire software packages. Note that modern programs are not a single executable EXE file, but a set that includes a huge number of additional components (the same DLLs, configuration files, etc.). Well, you will not recover every file? And if it was some kind of game? Yes, there may be tens of thousands of files. This is where elementary knowledge on restoring the performance of an integral software product will come in handy .
The easiest way to recover data
So, we continue to analyze an example with a girl who uninstalled a program on a computer. How to restore its integrity in the simplest way? The answer is banal: use the system recovery tool that is available in any modern "OS".
You just need to go to the appropriate section of the "Control Panel", and after starting specify the recovery point that precedes the removal of the software product. If one is missing, you can expand the list and select the one that works best.
But there are some disadvantages. The fact is that after restoring the system itself, applications that were installed later than the specified point will simply be deleted. This procedure will not affect user files. But this method is also suitable for cases when the application was deleted in the program and component section. A program recovering deleted programs will not work here - only a “native” system utility.
But the best option can be called the presence of a pre-created backup or image of the system (hard disk). It will be possible to recover all contents even with the help of the built-in Windows tools in just a couple of minutes. Unfortunately, most users do not create such copies, considering that they take up too much space on the hard drive. But in vain.
Programs for working with hard drives and logical partitions
Now another option: the same girl accidentally deleted the program. How to restore it if the removal was not done through the appropriate section of the control panel, but by formatting the hard drive? We will discuss now.
The situation, of course, is unpleasant, but there is a solution. Today you can find a fairly large number of applications called something like Unformat. Data Recovery or, as previously stated, Uneraser.
Suppose a user uninstalls a program. How to recover it after formatting a disk or partition using the appropriate application? Yes, very simple. We launch any utility, indicate the formatted section and perform the analysis. At the end of the process, the program will offer to save the data in another section. Accordingly, we select another volume and save the information there. The whole process is automated, and the user only needs to confirm the operations and choose a place to move the information.
What program recovers deleted files?
As for working with remote files, there are enough special utilities today. The simplest free program to recover deleted files is called Recuva.
True, it is designed to work with multimedia content (photos, graphics, video, audio), however, if you specify other content in the search conditions, the application will scan absolutely all the data and display the corresponding list. Everything that can be restored without problems is marked in green, the files that you can try to restore are marked in yellow, but there is no full guarantee, and the red color corresponds to objects that cannot be restored.
Now it's up to the small. We mark the necessary files and start the recovery process. Objects will be restored to the places or folders in which they were before the deletion. Almost all utilities of this type work approximately the same. The main minus is that they do not allow you to recover deleted folders.
Mobile Data Recovery
Since mobile Android systems are the most common today, let's see how to recover deleted programs on Android.
In principle, the ideal option, as for desktop PCs, is to create a backup. This is done elementarily in the settings menu with the selection of the appropriate section. After that, you can restore all deleted data by clicking on the button in the same menu.
There is a noteworthy auto-recovery function, which allows you to apply all the settings and parameters that were earlier after reinstalling the application. Very comfortably.
Alternatively, you can reset the device to its factory state. After a reboot, the system will offer to configure a new device or restore data when logging into an existing account. The only thing that is required here is an active Internet connection, since the process will be carried out not from the device, but from a remote server on which all user data is stored, including previously installed programs, contact lists, etc. Moreover, even the program A recovery program or file is not required. But really, why? All operations can be performed directly on the device without any connection to a computer and the use of specialized applications. This option is suitable only for working with memory cards (and even then not always).
Conclusion
Here is a brief summary of everything about the data recovery procedure. However, I think that understanding what any program that restores deleted programs and files is also understandable. It remains at last to give only one piece of advice: do not confuse work with individual files and entire software packages. These are completely different things. Accordingly, the methods for their recovery also vary. But, in principle, in all cases there is nothing complicated even for an unprepared user.