New link icon

Report · Jan 16, 2020

I open Bridge and all of a sudden there's what looks to be a chain link icon sitting on many of my thumbnails. I have no idea what its supposed to mean or what the general purpose is. Could someone please explain the consept behind this? And is this yet another forced entry by Adobe or is it possible to remove it somehow? Very annoying when I don't have a clue why it's there.

Bridge 10.0.2.131 / W10

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Try clearing the cache for that file that has a link icon and see if it disappears

Report · Jan 17, 2020

I right clicked one of the many files that has the link icon and chose Purge Cache for Selection but it didn't change anything. I tried it again on anoher image but it doesn't make remove the icon. I'm starting to belive that the link icon is connected to the creatice cloud system in some way. That Bridge has suddenly and unexpectedly (and unwantedly I may add) started to add link icons to the files that I have added copies of in the CC. If so I have no idea what the intent is. To me it's just annoying.

Report · Jan 17, 2020

I have never seen such a thing. Ever .............

Can you post a screen shot of the Bridge interface showing where the icon resides?

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Give me a couple of hours. I am working on it.

Jim

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Are these cloud documents?

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Some are PSD's and others are jpeg and PNG files. I have copies of some of the PSD files in my cloud work area but I also have link icons on files that are not copied to CC. The link icons suddenly appeared after last Bridge update. Never seen them before. The files are all old, so nothing I have added after last Bridge update. Bridge 10.0.2.131 / W10.

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Does the Metadata panel show any linked files?

Report · Jan 17, 2020

Yes, there's metadata attached to each linked file, at least the ones I went trough. Looks to be pointing to cc-api-storage.adobe.io

Report · Jan 18, 2020

OK

I am back.

Go into preferences/ meatdata/ scrool down past IPTC extensions.

You will see a box checked off next to "linked files"

Uncheck it.

Restart Bridge.

That should clear out the link icon from being displayed.

Jim

Report · Jan 18, 2020

That didn't change anything I'm afraid. The link icons are still there on all the files. I even re opened Bridge twice and went back to the preferences to see if the Linked Files were still unchecked.

Report · Jan 19, 2020

Can you close Bridge and go to your file manager.

Go to that file and rename it.

Then open the file in PS and save it in a different file format.

I would like to see what Bridge thumbnails will show.

I am thinking there metadata corruption with your file.

I and others have never seen this issue before.

Report · Jan 20, 2020

I opened a couple of PSD files and resaved them as PNG. That didn't change anything. Everything is the same with icon and metadata content on all the files. I then closed Bridge again and opened the resaved PNG files, then I saved them as jpg. The latter removed the link icon and metadata content but both things made the files useless of course as I need them as PSD documents.

Does the link icon appear on all files where either a copy is saved to CC and/or whenever a library asset is used in the file?!

Report · Feb 28, 2020

What kinds of file formats are you seeing this icon on?

For me I'm seeing them on .indd files and .tif + .psd files that contain linked assets or smart objects.

Report · Feb 28, 2020

Some are PSD's and others are jpeg and PNG files. I have copies of some of the PSD files in my cloud work area but I also have link icons on files that are not copied to CC. The link icons suddenly appeared after last Bridge update.

Report · Apr 28, 2020

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Report · Apr 28, 2020

I noticed the same icon on some jpg images in Bridge today and saw the linked files referenced in the metadata section.

After a bit of searching i found this in the Adobe help (https://helpx.adobe.com/bridge/using/metadata-adobe-bridge.html

Adobe InDesign CS5 and CS6 documents that contain linked files display a link badge in the upper-right corner of the thumbnail in the Content panel. The metadata for the linked files is available in Adobe Bridge.

Select an Adobe InDesign document with linked files in the Content panel of the Adobe Bridge window.

In the Metadata panel, expand the Linked Files section to view the names and paths of the linked files.

Right-click (Windows) or Control-click (Mac OS) the .indd file and choose Show Linked Files to see the linked files in the Contents panel.

I couldn't find a way of removing the links from the file though.

Report · Apr 28, 2020

You can't.

Report · Jan 20, 2022

I have noticed the link showing up also. I receive files from students and critique participants. I found that if you look in the Metadata Panel, not in Preferences, but in the actual Bridge Metadata panel and scroll down past the IPTC Extension, you will see the Linked Files menu. If you toggle it open it will tell you how or where it is linked. In most files I have received from students, the link does ahow as cloud-asset// with a long link to where it is linked. I suspect that either intentially or unintentially, the file was added to their cloud storage. When you save a file in Photoshop there is an option to "Save to cloud documents. In the latest versions of Photoshop it shows up as an option, in previous versions I think I remember that there was a check box that was automatically checked to save files to the cloud, which was a bit annoying. It was easy to inadvertantly save files to the cloud. Now you would have to make an effort to save the file to the cloud. I suspect that perhaps "perrybrus" as well as many of us my have unknowingly saved files to the cloud in the earlier versions of Photoshop. Perhaps the onlu way to eliminate the link is to go to your cloud account and delete the saved files from the cloud. Give it a shot and let us know, I could be wrong.

Report · Jan 24, 2022

This has got to be a bug. I have opened up in explorer and it is not saved to cloud storage - how annoying. This is new to me today, none of my other files have this icon. I don't use cloud storage so I would have been suprised to have it save there.

Report · Jan 24, 2022

Ok so I have found that a smart object (illustrator pasted paths) cause a cloud icon on the PSD layer. Then if you flatten this and save out the link icon dissappears from the thumbnail. However a JPG made fromn the same PSD (with illustrator smart object) still carries the link icon even though it is a JPG.

Report · Jul 18, 2022

I'm getting this too and my assumption (makes sense for me at least) is that in the file contains a linked image or library item: Something from your creative cloud library, either an icon, adobe font, or in my case, an image downloaded and added from adobe stock.

Report · Jan 29, 2023

I'm having this problem too and have no idea why the link icon is on some of my images and not others.

Report · Feb 01, 2023

I'm also getting this now for the first time in my life. I outsource some Real Estate photo editing overseas. Now sometimes some of my files will have this very randomly after I download my files from the editor.

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New link icon