Mac OneNote ver. 16.60 "Backups" does NOT show in Preferences

Anonymous
2022-04-15T23:57:37+00:00

PROBLEM

With the release of version 16.60, the Mac OneNote development team stated in the Mac App Store:

...Starting now, your notes on Mac will be automatically backed up on your Mac and not just in the cloud." "...go to OneNote preferences and select Backups. From there, you can customize your backup preferences and access your backed up notes."

The problem is there is no "Backups" section in preferences.

MY ACTIONS

I have uninstalled and reinstalled OneNote multiple times. Rebooted. Signed out and back into my Microsoft account. Nothing I have done has revealed the new Backups section.

I do not know if it makes any difference, but I am a license holder for Microsoft 365 Family edition of which OneNote is a part. I originally downloaded OneNote from the Microsoft site. Today, when I could not find "Backups," I uninstalled OneNote, and re-installed from the Mac App Store; that did not work either.

FOR THE RECORD

I'm a fanatical note-taker, organizational, planner, outliner type of person; OneNote is the best tool I have ever used. I have used OneNote daily since it was first released on Windows. I have gladly moved to Mac and continued to use the Mac version of OneNote. I have also regularly tried other note apps to see if there is anything better. By "better" what I actually mean is if there is another notes app as excellent as OneNote AND allows me to save my data locally. There has only been one contender and it is hardly supported anymore.

QUESTION

Does anybody have a solution?

Microsoft 365 and Office | OneNote | For home | MacOS

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Anonymous
2022-05-25T13:51:48+00:00

I am glad to report I received the Backups feature.

If you haven't yet received the Backups feature...

I suspect you will receive it in the near future. I wouldn't waste time to determine the cause of delay or to force the feature to appear.

  • April 16th, 2022, I saw in the App Store, the Devs announced the new Backups feature available
  • May 24th, 2022, I received the Backups feature
  • I have no idea why it took that long
  • I tried every tactic I know to force the Backups feature to appear--nothing worked. If it matters to you, look back in these posts and you'll find a post in which I listed everything I tried.

Backups works...

  • The Backups feature works quickly and well
  • I have not yet tried to restore data; I'll report my findings when I try it

Hope for the future...

Assuming the restore feature works properly, then my only hope for future abilities is to allow users their own local destination for backups. As of now, backups are forced to Microsoft's preset location, which is:

/Users/*your user name*/Library/Containers/com.microsoft.onenote.mac/Data/Library/Application Support/Microsoft User Data/OneNote/15.0/Backup

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  1. Anonymous
    2022-04-16T11:42:34+00:00

    Igor,

    Thank you for your speedy and thorough explanation.

    I have followed your instructions and the results are the same: no Backups in Preferences.

    These are all the things I have since tried...

    * Uninstalled OneNote and used CleanMyMac to find any "leftovers" and deleted those files

    * Showed hidden files in finder and deleted every instance of "Microsoft" "Office" "OneNote" etc.

    * Rebooted

    * Created an alias email address for my Microsoft account

    * Created an entirely new Microsoft account via the OneNote "Sign up free" option

    * Uninstalled OneNote again & deleted all cache files, com.microsoft.onenote.mac, hidden, etc. etc.

    * Rebooted

    * Created a new user account for my MacBook

    * Downloaded OneNote from the App Store and installed it under new user account

    * Uninstalled OneNote

    * Uninstalled OneNote again & deleted all cache files, com.microsoft.onenote.mac, hidden, etc. etc.

    * Uninstalled OneNote from my iPhone, iPad Mini & iPad Pro

    * Installed OneNote under new MacBook user account

    * Installed from the App Store on my 2017 MacBook Pro - did not show Backups

    Ad infinitum....

    Regardless of all attempts, OneNote persists without "Backups" in Preferences.

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    I have wasted nearly 9 hours.

    I see in the App Store that I am not the only person with this issue.

    Has anybody found a solution?

    Thank you.

    dlant

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  2. Anonymous
    2022-04-16T05:25:24+00:00

    Hello dlant,

    Thanks for using Microsoft products and posting in the community.

    As I understand you do not have a Backups option in OneNote 16.60 Preferences. We checked the OneNote on our side, but I’m afraid we didn’t meet the same behavior.

    And version of OneNote

    In this situation Clear OneNote cache. If the issue is related to corrupted OneNote client, clear cache will help fix it. Before clear cache, please sync all your notebooks in advanced. To clear cache, please follow steps as below:

    • First, make sure that OneNote is not running
    • From Finder Go > Go to Folder... (Shift+Cmd+G)
    • Enter "~/Library/Containers" and press Go (Return key)
    • Find the "com.microsoft.onenote.mac" folder
    • Select and delete that folder using File/Move to Trash (Cmd+Delete)

    If after clearing cache the issue remains, for a further troubleshooting please create a new user account and install OneNote. Please share your result with us.

    Feel free to post back to us if you need further support.

    Best Regards,

    Igor

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