I can't reinstall Adobe Application Manager (AAM)

[t33-guy]

I have Adobe CS5 installed (and working) on my Mac Pro tower running Lion (10.7.5) with 3 Terabytes of disk and 14 Gigabytes of memory. However, somehow, Adobe Application Manager (AAM) was deleted -- perhaps my carelessness, though I do not remember how that might have been.

Now I can't install new software, uninstall CS5, or even reinstall AAM. If I download AAM and try to install it, the installer fails to initialize (a close paraphrase of the message that appears in the popup), and suggests I contact the manufacturer. I have done this and unfortunately the telephone support have (so far) been unable to fix the problem, despite significant time spent trying various things with me.

Does anyone out there have any ideas as to how I might proceed.

I should add that I have "Repaired permissions" (more than once) and even downloaded a fresh copy of Lion and reinstalled it.  Nothing changed.

Thanks in anticipation your help.

[Jeff A Wright]

t33-guy please try running any remaining uninstallers located in Applicaitons/Utilities/Adobe Installers.  Once this is done you will then want to run the CS Cleaner Tool prior to attempting to reinstall the Adobe Application Manager.  You can find details on how to locate and use the CS Cleaner Tool at CS Cleaner Tool for installation problems | CCM, CS6, CS5.5, CS5, CS4, CS3 - http://helpx.adobe.com/creative-suite/kb/cs5-cleaner-tool-installation-problems.html.

[t33-guy]

Dear Jeff,

Just got back to my office. Many thanks for the reply.

The only "installers" I have in that location are for CS5 (which won't run because AAM is missing), plus and Dreamweaver CS6 uninstaller.

Unfortunately the Creative Suite Cleaner Tool requires that I uninstall Creative Suite, which I can't do because the AAM is missing, and won't install (I've tried several times in different ways under the direction of an Adobe telephone support person).

When trying to install AAM from a freshly loaded .dmg, the installer fils to initialize.

Supposedly my case is being escalated, but I've heard nothing so far. Everyone is, understandably, puzzled.

[Jeff A Wright]

t33-guy when you ran the CS Cleaner Tool did you receive a specific error message?

[t33-guy]

The cleaner tool won't rrun because it is necessary to uninstall th CS5 suite before running it, and I can't uninstall the CS5 suite because that requires Adobe Application Manager, which I can't install! It is a real Catch-22 situation.

[Abhijit_Kr_]

Hi t33-guy,

Please try creating a new Admin User Account and try installing AAM in there. If it get installed succesfully then Relogin to your User Account and rename OOBE Folders from these locations.

Please navigate to these folder from Go-Go to Folder and type

~/Library/Application Support/Adobe

/Library/Application Support/Adobe

Please let me know if it helps.

Regards,

[t33-guy]

I've actually tried installing it from the root account, both before and after reinstalling the OS from a freshly downloaded .dmg

Nothing changes.

[t33-guy · Accepted solution]

I got a call back from Adobe this morning and we deleted a few folders and we were then able to install AAM. This then allowed Acrobat XI Pro to be installed with no problems. Screen shot of the relevant entries in Trash for information, but I am not sure where the folders were originally located.

AAMUpdater had one empty folder in it ("1.0").  AAMUpdateInventory had a folder "1.0" in it which contained a whole bunch of stuff -- 70 folders of Adobe stuff on various aps, extension manager, fonts, ...  The "Application Manager" folder had seven folders and four files, and the "ApplicationManager" folder (note the absence of a space) had an empty AAMRefs folder only.

It all happened too quickly to make proper notes.

[Jeff A Wright]

Most of those directories can be found in Library/Application Support/Adobe.  The AAMUpdater is also located in Users/<UserName>/Library/Application Support/Adobe/.

[t33-guy]

Thanks for that, Jeff.

But none of the usual steps/installations worked until the Adobe technical support guy (to whom the problem was escalated) worked his magic, and quite possibly did things using his remote access that didn't get noted.

I am just glad everything is working again.