Evernote deleted itself from my PC!

[Rhymenoceros 1]

Turned on my Windows 11 machine just now to find that the evernote shortcuts no longer worked... Because the app had deleted itself from my PC! I've never had anything so bizarre happen in a lifetime of using a PC. No explanation, no update to approve, no message about it: it's just gone... What the hell?

[gazumped 11,652]

Hi.  Have you signed in via Evernote.com to confirm that your notes are still there?  If they are,  and you want to get your installation back you could also download the latest version and reinstall the local instance.  In 15 years or so of hanging around the forums here no one has ever had the app self-destruct before...

[agsteele 2,942]

Hard to say what has happened. The app uninstalled itself, the OS uninstalled it, some operator keyboard error or probably several other possibilities. If you have the Microsoft store version of Evernote then it is very possible that the store has uninstalled the app without permission. I've not seen any other reports of this. I think @gazumped is correct. Download the app afresh, reinstall and hopefully all should be well.

If, perchance, you were running the store version then be sure that the store version is uninstalled.  Then I would recommend the direct download from evernote.com

You will, of course, need your username and password.

[Astopia 1]

The same thing happened to me too today! I am 100% sure I did not uninstall it and this morning it was just gone from the program files folders and the shortcuts weren't working anymore.

As Rhymenoceros says: something like this never happened to me before in my life.

Downloading Evernote and installing it again worked, but still... it's utterly bizarre...

[agsteele 2,942]

8 minutes ago, Astopia said:

Downloading Evernote and installing it again worked, but still... it's utterly bizarre...

As above..  😉

[Mark-S 1]

Same / Similar thing happened to me just now. Differences: It Occurred just after my computer did today's largish Microsoft Windows 10 update. That is, I shut down all open apps before letting Windows restart to do it's update. Then restarted PC. (10-ish AM my local PST time zone). When things came back up the 3rd thing I brought up after Task Manager and Edge Browser was was Evernote via the icon on start menu. Icon on start "pane" had log but gave message that Evernote.exe was not longer available. Normal shortcut on Start menu is blank.

The one possible end-user mistake I may have made (usually innocuous)  was to quit evernote background task from the lower right taskbar notification area as one of my memory and disk saving habits during the previous hour as system and macafee were useing all disk resources while I was trying to complete some work before letting Microsoft run it's update.

searching for anything "evernote" or "evernote.exe" right after the failure to run, I did find an executable (Evernote-10.53.2-win-ddl-ga-3935-bcf2e6bf75-setup dot exe) in a pending folder under my user name's appdata folder. Dated today at 10:05 AM.

So I suspect that Everote and Windows were working an update at the same time and/or Windows update was trying to DO th eevernote update. either way, it failed at a point where the PC app was deleted before the update executable  did it's job.

I CAN see my data on Evernote on line so i suppose either doing a new download or running the update executable as administrator will bring back my app.  Anyone here know which is a safer way to go or 3rd option?

 

[agsteele 2,942]

Running the installer as admin gives you a 32-bit program. You can install without admin and that should do the job.

[PinkElephant 8,072]

From how I read this, there were 2 updating actions colliding, plus one of these crappy antivirus-feelsafe-snakeoil-vendor-apps adding to the mess-up. I don't think the "how could this happen" question is relevant here.

Unless the registry took a hit as well, it should be easy to remove anything left of the old EN install (maybe try Revo Uninstaller on that), download a new client, install it and start all over. It will download the notes from the cloud server, and you are good to go again.

About this interference with that MacAffee-something: The only antivirus that will securely not mess with an update (unless the updated app contains malware) is the Windows Defender. It is part of every Windows install, it is updated by Microsoft, it runs with minimal system resources, and it saves you money because you already have it. It is tested regularly as one of the best defense apps you can run, and it does not mess around deep down in your PCs engine room, as all others do. I would skip the MacAffee app right now - it probably does more harm than good.

[Siah Comp 0]

Same similar thing happened to me just now. Turned on my Windows 10 laptop just now to find that the evernote shortcuts no longer worked and app deleted.

[SynchronizedGroup 0]

Well something is going on. Not sure if it's an Evernote thing or something else.

I've reinstalled Evernote 3 times on my laptop. Today will be the 4th. Each time I've downloaded the most recent version from the Evernote site. 
Windows 10 Pro - 10.0.19045 Build 19045

[gazumped 11,652]

On 3/11/2023 at 6:16 PM, SynchronizedGroup said:

I've reinstalled Evernote 3 times on my laptop

Which is obviously not expected behaviour.  I've been using the app and a variety of device without issues - 'losing' the app isn't a catastrophe;  all notes are automatically synced back to the server,  and reinstalling the package will automatically restore the database.  It's a nuisance to have to restore ,  but not a big time-soak.  Don't know why the app would disappear - Windows shouldn't allow that either,  so I'd recommend a system check to see what's going on...

[agsteele 2,942]

On 3/11/2023 at 6:16 PM, SynchronizedGroup said:

I've reinstalled Evernote 3 times on my laptop. Today will be the 4th. Each time I've downloaded the most recent version from the Evernote site. 

I'm not sure if this will help, but I would try uninstalling Evernote using the Revo Uninstaller program. This will clear out all left over files and give a properly clean start.

[KatharineS 5]

Okay, this just happened to me too! I don't recall any big updates, issues with the computer, and I certainly didn't uninstall it myself...

It looks like the data is still on my computer, I'll just have to install it I guess, and point it at that directory.

[gazumped 11,652]

4 hours ago, KatharineS said:

I'll just have to install it I guess, and point it at that directory.

Hi.  No pointing should be required - just reinstall and Evernote will find its data files when you log in as normal.  For the record can you confirm your device,  OS and Evernote version?

[KatharineS 5]

Windows 10 Pro, latest version of Evernote -1 I assume.

I've reinstalled and it's all working well now!

 

[khalil.gdoura 0]

This happened to me twice on Windows. Never seen such a thing before.

Completely ridiculous coming from a so-called solution for productivity.

[gazumped 11,652]

3 minutes ago, khalil.gdoura said:

This happened to me twice on Windows. Never seen such a thing before.

Completely ridiculous coming from a so-called solution for productivity.

I assume you mean a v10 update uninstalled the Legacy app.  Were you still using Evernote 6.25.1?  Or had you installed the Legacy 'official' app 6.25.3 which does not update and should work more effectively with v10?

[ombwill 0]

Same thing has been happening to me the past few weeks, this morning I fire up my computer, Evernote has been (seemingly) uninstalled.  Which brings me here...  Unlike the 2 previous times, when I search for the shortcut in the windows menu, and try to load the program I get an error dialogue "Configuration File Error" (SEE ATTACHED)

Looks like I'll be reinstalling once again...

My system:

Edition    Windows 10 Home
Version    21H2
Installed on    ‎3/‎17/‎2022
OS build    19044.2965
Experience    Windows Feature Experience Pack 1000.19041.1000.0
 

[RussP41 7]

This just happened to me on Windows 10. I was running EverNote 10.56.9. I shutdown my laptop on Friday for the weekend, and restarted today. The EverNote shortcut no longer worked and EverNote was no longer on my system. I downloaded and installed the latest, EverNote 10.57.5, and all is well, but that certainly was disconcerting! I checked my Windows update history and there were no updates installed in the last few days. 

[gazumped 11,652]

2 hours ago, RussP41 said:

This just happened to me on Windows 10.

Hmmn.  Well - as before.  Weird stuff happens;  as long as you got your account back in good order,  I'd count it as a win!

[AlbertR 523]

15 hours ago, RussP41 said:

I was running EverNote 10.56.9. I shutdown my laptop on Friday for the weekend, and restarted today. The EverNote shortcut no longer worked and EverNote was no longer on my system.

Did You use the same Windows users whilst installing and using 10.56.9 and after restarting your LT? 

[RussP41 7]

 

6 hours ago, AlbertR said:

Did You use the same Windows users whilst installing and using 10.56.9 and after restarting your LT? 

Yes, I logged in as the same user.

[Guest]

• Is this happening with legacy (6.X) or the new client (10.X)?
• do you have per-machine installations (installed in C:\Program Files instead of AppData)?
• do you have the Windows App Store build or direct download?
• do you have auto-launch enabled (start Evernote with Windows option)?
• Only Windows 10 or 11 or both?

notes:

• reinstalling either App Store or direct download will not lose any of your data.
• there was a fix a few versions ago that allows you to defer the auto-update until relaunch.  So if you don't auto-update immediately, it will configure a pending auto-update on restart of the application.  After auto-updating, it will restart again with the new version.  There might be a long delay while it's doing the update (30+ seconds).  Some users go days (or weeks) before restarting and finally allowing Evernote to install.
• Legacy users are being migrated (auto-updated) to the newer client so things might be shuffling around (grey legacy icon replaced with new green elephant icon for example)

 

[RussP41 7]

• Is this happening with legacy (6.X) or the new client (10.X)?
  • This happened with the new client (10.X), although I originally installed 6.X a few years ago, so remnants may have been on the system. When I found Evernote was missing, I downloaded and installed Evernote10.57.5, and during setup, it asked to run a clean-up utility, which I don't recall seeing before, and then I got a message "Wait while Windows configures Evernote Legacy 6.52.2" and that was different than what I'd seen before also.
• do you have per-machine installations (installed in C:\Program Files instead of AppData)?
  • Evernote.exe is in C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Programs\Evernote, not in C:\Program Files 
• do you have the Windows App Store build or direct download?
  • Direct download
• do you have auto-launch enabled (start Evernote with Windows option)?
  • Open Evernote at startup is enabled
• Only Windows 10 or 11 or both?
  • Windows 10 only

...

• there was a fix a few versions ago that allows you to defer the auto-update until relaunch.  So if you don't auto-update immediately, it will configure a pending auto-update on restart of the application.  After auto-updating, it will restart again with the new version.  There might be a long delay while it's doing the update (30+ seconds). 
  • When I restarted my system, the first thing I did was try to open Evernote and it wasn't there. However, I don't know what I could have done to interrupt Evernote's auto-update process, if that was what was happening. I went to the Evernote forums to find out if this was a known problem before I downloaded the setup file and installed it, so Evernote would have had a few minutes to auto-update and restart before I installed it again.

[Guest]

Thanks for the feedback.  Yes, the new client install detected the legacy version and ran the uninstaller for it (cleanup utility with the User Access Control confirm dialog).

I'm going to test if there's a problem with the auto-launch attempting to do an auto-update during the startup.  Maybe because it's during the login/boot of Windows it is failing somehow.

[Astopia 1]

This happened to me again today! 🫢

How is this even possible???

[agsteele 2,942]

The answers are the same as when this thread started. 

It could be the operating system, Evernote, user error or likely other issues.

As I suggested much earlier, reinstall then uninstall using Revo Uninstaller to properly clean out the installation.

Finally reinstall with the direct download from evernote.com and login.

Hopefully that will resolve things for you.

[Dave-in-Decatur 3,938]

16 hours ago, Astopia said:

This happened to me again today! 🫢

How is this even possible???

A very good question. I did a search for "software disappearing from windows computer" and found pages with some suggestions, e.g. relating to Windows updates. None of them involved the software deleting itself, though!

[Donnagwd 3]

And happens to me today. I clicked the button to close and update and it's gone! This is crazy.

 

[PinkElephant 8,072]

It needs to uninstall the prior version, to install the new one. That’s part of replacing the existing release by the new one.

If the install fails, you end up with the uninstall of the old version.

Just download the installer, and try again to install. It can’t uninstall a prior version that is already gone.

[khal 0]

Happened to me. Evernote worked fine yesterday. Today, my folder C:\Users\XXX\AppData\Local\Programs\Evernote is empty.

I guess Evernote failed/crashed during its update or something like that. Reinstalling it fixed it.

I'm using the latest version of the client, Windows 10 Pro

[gazumped 11,652]

8 hours ago, khal said:

Happened to me. Evernote worked fine yesterday. Today, my folder C:\Users\XXX\AppData\Local\Programs\Evernote is empty.

I guess Evernote failed/crashed during its update or something like that. Reinstalling it fixed it.

I'm using the latest version of the client, Windows 10 Pro

Hi.  Updates can fail for a number of non-Evernote reasons.  Glad you were able to fix it.

[Trones 1]

Happened to me today

[Jon/t 1,275]

Bizarre! Maybe a failed update or something. Is it the Windows store version or the download from the EN website?

[jblaustein11@gmail.com 0]

The same thing continues to happen on my Windows 11 computer every time I shut the PC off and turn it on. Latest version. Ridiculous. Evernote continues to surprise with this BS. I've been a user since almost the beginning. Legacy works the best and is simple. The new owners are not doing their homework and testing the versions.

[PinkElephant 8,072]

Did you read through the thread ?

This is likely a Windows problem. Uninstall using Revo Uninstaller (if he can find an install).

Then get the newest installer from Evernote.com. Install.

[mlinder 0]

I'm using windows 11, and Evernote uninstalls intself at least each time I restart the computer. I've installed it like five-six times now...

[gazumped 11,652]

2 hours ago, mlinder said:

I'm using windows 11, and Evernote uninstalls intself at least each time I restart the computer. I've installed it like five-six times now...

Hi.  Not expected behaviour.  What's your device / OS / current Evernote version?  Have you tried uninstalling with Revo Uninstaller (Windows) to ensure a 'clean' reinstall?