Have lost settings and data

Hi, i've got a refurbished G4 running OS x.4.10 and until recently it's been working fine but i logged on the other night to find that the desktop had reverted to default settings, iphoto had started from scratch (and lost all my photos) - the same with mail (lost all emails and settings), address book, stickies and other dashboard items including previously downloaded stuff - not good.
Fortunately i backup everything so i've not lost much but i'd like to know what has happened and how i can get the lost data back without having to upload it all again from my external drive (which could take hours).
As far as i know, i've not done anything unusual to cause this to happen - the previous days work involved downloading a couple of files from apple.com and changing some settings for address book - other than that i was just typing a word document and sending e-mails.
If anyone can help by suggesting what went wrong and how to avoid it again i would be very grateful, also - can i get my settings and data back without having to upload it file by file (i don't think my sanity could cope with that).
Adam.

Hi Adam,
If the Netinfo database becomes corrupt your account files can become "lost". They can be recovered if you have a recent backup of the database. It's backed up when the cron jobs run (when the computer is on over night or manually via Terminal or a maintenance application). The following article explains how to do it.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107210
John

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