I had the usual error sign that my picture could not be displayed when I opened an item. I thought to remember well that if I’d just delete the items they would be imported again and that the metadata would automatically be added and they would be merged as well. Well, this hasn’t happened so now more than 600 items I’ve created with 1300 pictures and their meta data are not in the file anymore. Is there ANY way to retrieve this data or recover it? This was more than a week of work…
All the best,
Gert
Can you elaborate on which metadata you’re trying to import exactly? Tropy will import embedded Exif or XMP metadata selectively, based on your current default template, so if you’re strictly talking about metadata which is embedded into your photos, then yes, it may be possible to import them automatically.
Metadata that you manually added in Tropy cannot be imported of course.
If you delete an item in Tropy it will not be removed completely right away: it’s still saved in your project file for some time and you can recover it by going to the ‘Deleted Items’ list, selecting items and then restoring them via the context menu.
If you a long time has passed since you deleted the items (or if you’ve permanently deleted the items via the context menu on the deleted items list) the items are completely removed from your project file. The only way you could recover them is from a backup of the project file from before the items were permanently removed.
Thank you for your quick response! What exactly is the “context menu”? 
It’s the menu you can get by right-clicking e.g. an item.
We cleaned-up the context menus in the latest release and unfortunately I just realized that the restore commands are missing from the context menu of deleted items! This is rather bad timing: if you’re on 1.8 you can’t restore the deleted items via the UI – in that case you could briefly install 1.7 and restore your items there, or, if you prefer, you can send me your project file and I will restore the deleted items for you.
I think i’d rather send the project file to you, how do I export it and send it to you?
I normally recommend using a service like Firefox Send, which is currently unavailable, or Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud etc. to share larger files, but since project files are not that big you can try uploading it here and sending it to me in a direct message or you can send me an attachment at sylvester.keil@gmail.com – either way, you’d have to send me your .tpy file and not make any further changes while I have the file (since I’ll send you an updated version of the file back).
I have just emailed you the file and my problem and demands, thank you in advance!
Yes, sorry I was away for a couple of hours. I just sent you back the project file with the pertinent items restored.