Stacks disappeared from Dock

mid 2007 MacBook, 10.7.5
Hi, I just discovered Stacks and thought it would be great for cleaning up my desktop.
I created the folder, labelled it 'Stacks' and put it in the Dock alongside Documents and Downloads, put files and folders inti it, checked that everything was accessible. All was fine until I rebooted about an hour later. Stacks folder was replaced by gray question mark.
I cannot open it, I can't find any reference to the folder through Spotlight, EasyFind or Stella Phoenix.
Has anyone any suggestions please.
I'm going to lose a lot of my work if I can't find this folder.
To compound the issue my backup drive started to fail and I have not backed up for a couple of weeks.
Any help really appreciated. Many thanks

When you created the folder where did you put it? Dragging it to the Dock creates an alias of it.
It should still be where you created it. If you moved it or deleted it, that's why you get the question mark (although OS X can keep track of it if moved).

Thanks, Cradom.
I see the cause now. I created the folder on the desktop and then moved it to the dock. Deleted the folder that remained on the DT. I'm going to run StellarPhoenix again but this time "deleted recovery" and see how things go.
Many thanks - feel a lot more hopeful now,
Tamati

Hope there wasn't anything important in that folder. Next time make the folder someplace like Documents and leave it there.
Moving it shouldn't break the alias but deleting it sure will. Good luck.

Back again.
(although OS X can keep track of it if moved). How ? Anything I can do to find it through OS X rather than wait a long time while SP does its job (all else seems to slow down, become erratic while that's working)
Thank you
T

You said you deleted it. That's not moving, it's removing. If you emptied the Trash it's probably gone.
There are file recovery apps. Some are better than others. There's a reason the dialog says "This cannot be undone". It's not easy getting it back, if at all.

@tamati

I created the folder on the desktop and then moved it to the dock. Deleted the folder that remained on the DT

Click to expand...

If you did exactly what you have stated, then I'm afraid the Folder and its contents are gone (I'm assuming you emptied the Trash as well because that's where deleted items are placed on initial "delete").

If the contents of this Folder are absolutely vital, then stop doing any more work on the Mac and download one of the disk recovery apps eg Data Rescue 4 or Disk Warrior and see if it can find it. You don't have to pay for the demo version of the app; but if it can find the Folder, you will have to part with quite a lot of money to recover it.

Good luck. I'm truly sorry to hear of your plight.

Ian

If you get this problem worked out, then we can explain the concept of Stacks to you. You don't have to create a new folder to create Stacks.