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routeToWeb
Participating Frequently
August 4, 2023
Question

Dreamweaver fails to show the hidden characters on the last tab that reopens on startup

  • August 4, 2023
  • 8 replies
  • 3626 views
Every time I start Dreamweaver with the "Reopen documents on startup" option active, the file associated with the right most tab fails to show its hidden characters, whilst the other files do. I have to close the file then reopen it if I want to see the tabs, space etc. It's not a major bug, but it shouldn't be happening. Does anybody else have this issue and is there a fix?

    8 replies

    neraron
    neraron
    Participating Frequently
    July 31, 2025

    @routeToWeb I found the reason for. It's based on the MMDocumentTypes.xml inside the configuration folder:

    C:\Users\[yourUSER]\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Dreamweaver 2021\[your_LANG]\Configuration\DocumentTypes\

    You have to add the attributes hasCodeColoring="true" and hasSyntaxHighlighting="true" to documenttypes, where you want to use it. It seems this setting got broken after some DW updates in the past and since them DW is only guessing which file-type is opended and this returns into this issue. There is no GUI-based setting anymore but it solved for me the problem.

     

    Example:

     

    <documenttype id="LESS" internaltype="Text" winfileextension="less" macfileextension="less" file="Default.less" writebyteordermark="false" mimetype="text/css" hasCodeColoring="true" hasSyntaxHighlighting="true">
    Nancy OShea
    Community Expert
    Nancy OSheaCommunity Expert
    Community Expert
    February 19, 2025

    I can't reproduce this on my machine.  Sorry.

    Can you show us a screenshot of what you mean?

     

     

    Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert
    R
    routeToWebAuthor
    Participating Frequently
    February 19, 2025

    Example attached. I hope it's enough and you don't need all the screen showing. Dreamweaver preferences were not changed between shots, they were just taken from two different automatically opened files when I fired up Dreamweaver.

      neraron
      neraron
      Participating Frequently
      February 19, 2025

      @routeToWebThanks.

      neraron
      neraron
      Participating Frequently
      February 19, 2025

      This issue still exists in the current version for Windows and macOS. It doesn't matter which OS-version - just this bug is still there!

      neraron
      neraron
      Participating Frequently
      February 19, 2025

      This is really anoying and this bug exists since so many months. It happends also radomly, when you are just trying to open a file after the file before was opened with shown hidden characters. I can reproduce it on Win10 (much more than on Win11), Win11 and MacOS (Ventura up to Sequoia). For a paid software like this, Adobe has to fix it finally. Each simple editor like notepad++ or visual studio code can show the hidden characters without any issue.

      L
      Community Expert
      L e n aCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      August 14, 2023

      I’m glad that it helped you.

       

      If you haven't already done so, you should consider synchronizing with your CC account, which is very useful to avoid losing a large number of settings - Synchronize Dreamweaver settings with Creative Cloud

      R
      routeToWebAuthor
      Participating Frequently
      August 14, 2023

      Thanks, Win+Ctrl+Shift appears to have worked. Bit of a pain trying to remember all the other preferences that were lost in the process, but hopefully they are all now back to how they were.

      L
      Community Expert
      L e n aCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      August 11, 2023

      Did you try reset the preferences
      Restoring Preférences

      https://helpx.adobe.com/dreamweaver/kb/restore-preferences-dreamweaver.html

       

      Clearing preferences

      Manually or by holding Win+Ctrl+Shift or Cmd+Opt+Shift while launching DW

      Nancy OShea
      Community Expert
      Nancy OSheaCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      August 7, 2023

      It might be a graphics memory or site cache issue. 

      Go to Site > Advanced > Recreate Site Cache. 

      Or just hit F5 to refresh your screen.

       

      Given that Dreamweaver is in minimal maintenance status, bugs don't get much attention.  DW is only receiving occasional security & compatibility patches now.

       

      Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert
      B
      Community Expert
      Ben MCommunity Expert
      Community Expert
      August 4, 2023

      What OS? Does it happen with all documents or just specific ones? 

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