Sorting nightmare: I just noticed that rows were out of order!

So when I sorted a column it seemed to sort independently of the rest of the row.
How could this possibly happen?
If you sort by column obviously you want to sort the rest of the row, not just that one column.
Luckily I have backups otherwise hours and hours of work would have been lost.
Is this a common problem with Calc?
Is there a way of getting Calc to back up every few minutes storing copies somewhere? I’d like to be able to go back say 5 minutes or 15 minutes instead of my nightly backup and lose a day of work.

If there are data in the neighboring columns, Calc will ask you.
Usually I press Shift+Space to select complete rows before sorting.

Take a look at: Saving Documents Automatically

Also consider this extension Timestamp Backup » Extensions

Have you considered making it a table with the top row as a filtered header row. Then, any sort/select action on any column will automatically reflect across all the columns. One thing to remember. If a formula defines a range say =Sum(A2:A5) then those numbers can’t be tracked to their new locations as they may not be consecutive cells. Better to use =A2+A3+A4+A5 then wherever they end up they will be targeted specifically.

Thank you!