Missing data folder

Hi! I’m using Audacity 2.4.2 on macOS Catalina 10.15.7. I was recently trying to clean up, consolidate, and organize a bunch of files & folders on my computer. I had quite a few Audacity projects on my desktop, and in an attempt to be efficient and put each project into its own folder, I decided rather than moving the .aup file and the data folder into a separate new folder for each piece, I’d just move the .aup file into that piece’s data folder. I should have known that Audacity saves the .aup file separately from the data folder for a REASON! As a result, every project that I did that to will now no longer open - I get an “Error Opening Project” popup that says ‘Couldn’t find the project data folder: “filename_data”’. Have I lost those projects forever, or is there a way to recover these files so they will open again?

Moving the AUP file just outside the _DATA folder didn’t work?

Double Click the AUP file and the show should open.

The other thing you can’t do is change the names of anything outside of Audacity. Open an AUP file (don’t save anything) in a text editor and read it. The original name of the Project is in there.

Koz

When I double click the aup file it doesn’t open, but I just discovered if I separate them like you suggest I can now open it by going to Audacity>File>Open> Thanks!