InDesign crashes at startup

Did you trash your preferences?

Trash, Replace, Reset, or Restore the application Preferences: http://forums.adobe.com/thread/526990

Did you install Java?

Try a different user account?

If that doesn't fix it, I'd reinstall InDesign. OS upgrades can be troublesome, and an ID uninstall/reinstall doesn't take that long anyhow.

Uninstall again, then run the clean tool: Resolve installation problems with CS5 Cleaner Tool and reinstall, or you can wait for John to come back with a list of files/folders to try removing from your user library. Something in there is corrupt.

Wait, wait. I think we don't think the cleaner tool is going to help. As far as I'm aware, it does not remove user-specific state, so if the problem goes with a user account, the cleaner tool won't help...gotta find that list, back in a bit...

Java is up and running. Uninstalled/reinstalled ID twice. Other user accounts work without any problems. It s really strange...

OK, the information that other user accounts work means it really cannot be an installation problem. So reinstalling won't help and Java isn't related to the problem., etc., etc.

As Peter suggested, I have a list of folders/files to remove from your user Library directory. Note that under Lion, you must hold down Option to see the Library folder in the Go menu of the Finder. It is hidden from normal navigation.

Here's my list:

~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Adobe InDesign CS5.5
~/Library/Caches/Adobe InDesign
~/Library/Caches/com.adobe.InDesign
~/Library/Preferences/Adobe InDesign
~/Library/Preferences/com.adobe.InDesign.plist
~/Library/Preferences/com.adobe.InDesign.plist.lockfile
~/Library/Saved Application State/com.adobe.InDesign.savedState

So try quitting InDesign, getting rid of all of those (you can move them to a temp. folder on the Desktop instead of deleting them just to be safe!), and then restarting.

John Hawkinson wrote:

 

Wait, wait. I think we don't think the cleaner tool is going to help. As far as I'm aware, it does not remove user-specific state, so if the problem goes with a user account, the cleaner tool won't help...gotta find that list, back in a bit...

OK, I've never had to run the tool on any of my systems, and I'm on Windows, so I don't know for sure, but I've always assumed it would remove all traces, including user profile or library folders (the uninstallers will do that, if you tell them to). I've got a test system to break down in the next month or two, though, so I'll try to remember to run the tool and see what happens before I restore my clean image.

That's great.

Do you run Suitcase?

Have you tried trashing the Photoshop prefs? I think there's just one file for them.

John is the main man for this, but it looks to me like the problem is in Font Xplorer, so most likely either there is a bad font on the system, or there's an incompatibility. You might want to see if there are updates, or remove the auto-activation plugins.

There should be plugins folders for each application. I'm on Windows, so I can't tell you where, exactly, to look on your Mac.

Peter Spier wrote:

 

John is the main man for this, but it looks to me like the problem is in Font Xplorer, so most likely either there is a bad font on the system, or there's an incompatibility. You might want to see if there are updates, or remove the auto-activation plugins.

Looks like it got straightened out, but yes, the crash was clearly in Font Xplorer.

good idea, i thought about a font problem,too. Where do i remove the plug ins?

At the end of the crash report it tells you where the files are:

0x111bb3000 -        0x11249aff7 +FontExplorer X Pro for Photoshop CS5 (3.2.1 - ???) <C8383148-9AB8-2C07-43C6-3B19E7D0E0B6> /Applications/Adobe Photoshop CS5.1/*/FontExplorer X for Photoshop CS5.plugin/Contents/MacOS/FontExplorer X Pro for Photoshop CS5

So in this case: /Applications/Adobe Photoshop CS5.1/Plug-Ins/FontExplorer X for Photoshop CS5.plugin

InDesign crashing 5 seconds after the start up, tried deleting the files as mentioned in the earlier thread...

Help!

Version? OS? Do you have a crash report?

InDesign CS6

crash - Pastebin.com

Help!!

First things first, patch InDesign to 8.0.2

still not working!!

Post a new crash report...

Crsh-2 - Pastebin.com

I tried patching it dint work...

If Help > Updates.. does not work, download and install the path manually from Adobe - InDesign : For Macintosh : Adobe InDesign CS6 8.0.2 update - All Languages

thanks so much this worked for me! thank you everyone.

Thanks, this worked GREAT!

CS5 InDesign crashing on new MacBook Pro running El Capitan. I've tried running on a new admin account on the same system and it works. When I follow the steps to trash perfs, and copy over from working account, it still crashes. Here is the error log. Any help is greatly appreciated!

CS5 InDesign Crash Log - Pastebin.com

CS5 is not and never will be supported under El Capitan.

That said, the one thing that seems to help is turning off auto hide menu bars in the general preferences.

Illustrator and Photoshop for CS5 work just fine under my account. InDesign will work under a new admin account. All on El Capitan.

Re: InDesign crashes at startup

BobLevine

CS5 is not and never will be supported under El Capitan.

That said, the one thing that seems to help is turning off auto hide menu bars in the general preferences.

This helped for me thanks!

I just had the same problem with Creative Cloud InDesign – it just wouldn't open. It kept on crashing. But this "turning off auto hide menu bars" really did the trick for me too. Thank you for the tip!

why does that work? It's so random??? Happy that my InDesign works now but geez, come on Adobe!

What makes you think it's Adobe's problem? It might well be, but that is a new O/S setting and you'd think Apple would have tested it against high end applications.

Was sitting here for a good 2 hours trying to figure out why InDesign CS5 suddenly crashed upon launching on El Capitan. Worked previously so I was quite confused.

Turned off the 'auto-hide menu bars' option in system preferences and bam, it works again!

That seriously helped! I'm astonished by this, for I have tried everything to make it work again (InDesign kept shutting down, tried new admin, that worked for only a week).

So just one simple change in preferences and it worked again. Thank you so much!