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• • August 4, 2010 at 12:21 pm #56579
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    We've just started putting InDesign CS5 through its paces in prep for rolling it out in our next instruction semester, so we're still a bit green with the release. But we're already headed to a train crash with bugs we're seeing and would appreciate the input of those of you who have been working with it for a while.

    I'd like ask for your kind help to see if you have workarounds for the problems we're seeing.

    Any suggestions or shared experiences you can provide would be much appreciated!

    1. Window resizing problem with Wacom tablet:

    Resizing the application window with a Wacom pen/tablet does not work properly. The app retains the “drag” even after the pen is lifted and the window follows the pen on its next command. This results in a constant accidental resizing of the window to a tiny box up in the corner of the screen. We were very surprised to find out how seriously this hampered productivity.

    2. Documents from CS4 crash on Save, Export, or PDF Export (or export of any kind) when brought into CS5:

    This is a show stopper, as we have numerous legacy documents from CS4 in both the college and our company that must be reused. Cost of rebuilding these docs in CS5 is completely prohibitive: it would run to 6 figures. Anyone know of a reliable fix? We have to stay with CS4 until this is resolved.

    3. If any of you are aware of other issues we should test before we make the transition, I'd really appreciate hearing about them.

    Thanks in advance!

    Tom Dearie

    Communications Architect, Threesixty Creative

    Instructor, Digital Publishing Program, Toronto Image Works

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:05 pm #56582
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    2: I've heard of this. Solutions seems to be use File>Export nd choose IDML and then open that and export from that file.

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:08 pm #56583
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Thanks Eugene

    But the problem we're seeing is that CS4 documents, opened in CS5, crash when any kind of Save or Export is done, including IDML or PDF.

    They open fine, we can work with them, but they crash on save or close.

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:08 pm #56584
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    3: There's too many to list off the top of my head.

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:09 pm #56585
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    In that case tom – I suggest that you export the file to IDML from CS4 and open that in CS5.

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:12 pm #56586
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    I was a bit harsh with No.3

    I've been using CS5 for a while for numerous projects and I've not really had any major hiccups. There are some things I'm not happy with, but I hope they can be fixed in later updates.

    There are quite a few oddities, but overall it's pretty cool.

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:13 pm #56587
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    The best thing for me is Span and Split columns, so many layout options at the switch of a character style, it's amazing!

  • August 4, 2010 at 1:51 pm #56588
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Well, I tried your suggestion of of exporting from CS4 as IDML and importing to CS5 IDML. Results:

    1. Export from CS4 as IDML and Import to CS5 IDML allows me to at least save the CS4 document in CS5 without crashing. However, it still crashed on PDF export.

    2. Rebuilding prefs now allows me to Export a new document created in CS5 to PDF. But exporting the imported CS4 doc still crashes CS5 on export.

    Money clock is ticking, but at least we've got some bits solved.

    Thanks for helping.

  • August 4, 2010 at 4:00 pm #56591
    David Blatner

    Keymaster

    If the problem is primarily exporting to PDF, it's likely something to do with pdf engine, not InDesign per se. Try different PDF Presets. Try different flattener settings, etc.

  • August 4, 2010 at 8:05 pm #56593
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Yes – it's a PDF engine issue to be sure.

    Other issues were cleared up with a prefs rebuild (not the window resizing issue though).

    The file will output 392 pages from CS4 in one go, no problems.

    In CS5, it will output pages 1-100 okay; 1-110 crashes it; 100-110 works okay; 100-150 crashes it, etc.

    Binary isolation is not proving very effective because of the wacky combinations, so changing settings is certainly worth a try, though I'm not optimistic.

    I've been following the thread on the Adobe forum, and they know something's up with handling CS4 legacy files. But they don't have a handle on it yet. Our students are having all manner of issues going back and forth between CS4 and CS5, including this one.

    I'll try various PDF export settings tomorrow.

    Cheers

  • August 5, 2010 at 3:45 pm #56599
    Somerset Walmsley

    Member

    Try updating/reinstalling your Wacom driver to address issue #1. My coworker used a tablet exclusively (bamboo model, I think) and hasn't had a single problem with it and CS5.

    Likewise with InDesign, we haven't had any problem opening, saving or editing all of our legacy files after a couple months of using CS5.

  • August 5, 2010 at 4:04 pm #56600
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Rebuilding the prefs has much minimized the window resizing issue on my Intuos 4 tablet with InDesign. It's still a little skittish, but easily manageable.

    We're on the latest drivers and updated as soon as we saw a problem. I'm going to have the students rebuild prefs and see if it works for them too.

    Cheers

    Tom

  • August 5, 2010 at 4:14 pm #56601
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Okay, a suggestion from Bob Levine has solved our PDF export problems with CS4 legacy files on CS5:

    Rather than exporting to PDF, we added the document to a book, closed the document, and exported the Book to PDF through the Book Options Panel. This circumvented the background export and forced the export to the foreground. The entire 392 page document exported, problem-free.

    This fits with Adobe staff's suspicion that the background PDF function is choking and crashing on some legacy files.

    Several of the many people on the Adobe thread dealing with this problem have also confirmed that this works (though there's no guarantee it will work for everyone, as there are a few different issues in the PDF engine affecting people differently).

    If you have some big legacy files and are having trouble, give it a try.

    Thanks Bob!

    Tom

  • August 5, 2010 at 4:55 pm #56602
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Re the tablet/window resizing issue, our students confirm that rebuilding prefs does not solve the issue.

    Most of them are still finding the window resize over-sensitive on a wide range of tablets. On closer exam, I'm finding the rebuild of prefs didn't work for me either. The pen still fails to let go of the window control surface unless I left the panel far off the page and I get a “throw” effect that continues the resizing motion in my last direction of movement. It's also more sensitive in some directions than in others.

    I'm thinking it might be an interaction of the pen and the new live-redraw or gestures features.

    Will wait to see whether Wacom releases an update.

  • August 6, 2010 at 12:34 am #56603
    Uwe Laubender

    Member

    Tom Dearie said:

    Okay, a suggestion from Bob Levine has solved our PDF export problems with CS4 legacy files on CS5:

    Rather than exporting to PDF, we added the document to a book, closed the document, and exported the Book to PDF through the Book Options Panel.

    ---

    You can try my Export PDF script for exporting in “foreground” with single files not already stacked in a book. It circumvents the bug by using the “old” method of outputting in foreground. That method is still available by scripting.
    You find the script here on Indesignsecrets in the forums:
    https://creativepro.com/for…..h-cs5#2709

    Uwe

  • August 6, 2010 at 1:25 pm #56608
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Correction of my spelling error:

    …the pen still fails to let go of the control surface unless I lift the pen far off the page…

    Sorry for any confusion.

    Tom

  • August 6, 2010 at 1:30 pm #56609
    Anonymous

    Inactive

    Uwe Laubender said:

    Tom Dearie said:

    Okay, a suggestion from Bob Levine has solved our PDF export problems with CS4 legacy files on CS5:

    Rather than exporting to PDF, we added the document to a book, closed the document, and exported the Book to PDF through the Book Options Panel.

    ---

    You can try my Export PDF script for exporting in “foreground” with single files not already stacked in a book. It circumvents the bug by using the “old” method of outputting in foreground. That method is still available by scripting.
    You find the script here on Indesignsecrets in the forums:
    https://creativepro.com/for…..h-cs5#2709

    Uwe

    ---

    Thanks Uwe. I've never scripted in InDesign. Where would you enter this script?

    The Book method works fine for me for the small purpose of dealing with legacy docs, but I'm curious about your script solution just because I'm an info-packrat.

    Cheers

    Tom

  • August 10, 2010 at 12:39 pm #56638
    robin from OC

    Member

    Make sure you only have Acrobat 9 installed. Your system may not have completely removed version 8, which will cause Acrobat to crash. This would happen repeatedly here in another situation also, with only Acrobat 8 installed and Reader 9 installed on the same computer.

    I have managed to go from CS3 to 5 without any problems. Can you backsave your CS4 docs to CS3 and try that?

    In the “old days,” if you tried to save a file made on a trial version of something – altho' not necessarily Adobe products – , it would crash. Could be a permissions problem.

    And as simple as this sounds, corrupted fonts have been known to do wierd things like this.

  • May 23, 2011 at 12:46 pm #59684
    Carina Marano

    Participant

    Any word on how to minimize the lag on window resizing? I'm just using a mouse but experiencing the same issue. Also, anyone know why they changed the ability for InDesign to remember the size and placement of the document's last state?

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