Hidden Gems in Your IDE – Local History
Accidentally deleted half a day's work? IntelliJ's Local History and VS Code's Timeline can save you – even without a git commit. Here's how to use them.
Recover Lost Work Without Git – Your IDE's Built-in Time Machine
Being a developer means oscillating between joy and pain. After accidentally deleting several hours of work, I discovered a lifesaver: the IDE's local history feature.
IntelliJ IDEA: Local History
IntelliJ's Local History tracks all changes to files, directories, and the entire project – like a git history without commits. You can compare states, go back in time, and restore previous versions.
Find it via: right-click on a file or directory → Local History → Show History.
VS Code: Timeline
VS Code has a similar feature called Timeline, visible in the Explorer panel at the bottom. It's limited to individual files, but effective. To restore a deleted file: recreate a blank file with the same name, then copy the content from Timeline.
Key Points
- Both features work independently of git
- They provide a diff view of file changes
- IntelliJ's Local History covers directories and the whole project; VS Code's Timeline is file-level only
These tools complement git – they don't replace it. But they've saved more than a few developers from a very bad day.