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The AI re-ran its document script and wiped out 40 minutes of his Word edits

A session generated a Word document with a script. The user then edited the document in Word for about 40 minutes and saved. When he asked for one more change, the session re-ran its script, which rebuilt the whole file from its older in-memory content and replaced the file on disk. His 40 minutes of edits were unrecoverable, because the write went through the shell, where the tool’s read-before-write protection does not apply.

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How it works

  1. Session generates a document by script
  2. User edits it in Word for about 40 minutes and saves
  3. Asks for one more change
  4. Session re-runs the script from stale content
  5. The file is replaced wholesale
  6. 40 minutes of edits unrecoverable

Why it’s worth knowing

Co-editing a document with the agent is an ordinary workflow, and it falls exactly between the two write paths, one guarded and one not.

Where it’s from

Summarized from a public post on github.com. See the original ↗

Upgraded prompt

A ready-to-use prompt for this idea, built from research on what makes AI agents do the job right: who the AI should be, the exact steps, and a check to make sure it was done the way you wanted.

1Who the AI should be
2The prompt, with the steps
3The check when it’s done
Upgraded prompts are coming soon.

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