Disable Splash Screeen – in Illustrator yes, but across CC

[Kim Hi]

Hello,

As far as I can understand, earlier versions had a check-box option under Preferences > General to "Disable splash screen". This is now (again, as far as I am able to see) not there any more. We just have to live with it.

I find it ridiculous and depressing and frankly outrageous that every time I open Illustrator (or Photoshop, or InDesign) I am forced to look at some randomly chosen image that I do not want, and have not asked, to see.

Adobe: we pay (good money, every month, every year) to be able to use the professional industry standard tools that you make.  Be professional about it. Let us be able to use the tools, as they are, with as little other visual interference as possible.

We are anyway constantly barraged by images. We should be able to make our workplace (which in this case includes your software) free of this noise if we so choose to.

I know I am not alone in this.

Unless there is a way to disable the splash screen visuals, and unless Adobe is willing to give us one, can we petition them? Is there a way to set up a poll on these forums?

I realize some of you may see this as a ridiculous concern, but it is doing my head in. I know I can look away or close my eyes or whatever, but why should I have to? Why should I not be able to use a tool that I pay for, undisturbed? If every time you opened your writing software, a voice would read out loud the same random poem, or if every time you picked up your camera you had to stare at the same random photograph taken by someone else, you would go insane, I think.

Please help or share your thoughts or ideas.

Thanks

K

[Monika Gause]

This setting never existed.

What you can do is go through the Illustrator application folder resp the application package (on Mac OS) and look for the splash screen png images. Change them to whatever you like (when you do it wrong, Illustrator might stop working).

If you want to file a feature request, please use: http://illustrator.uservoice.com

Maybe you want to propose one of your own images as splash screen, I assume you can use the same site for that.

[Kim Hi]

Hi Monika, and thank you for your swift response.

What do you mean by "when you do it wrong, Illustrator might stop working"?

Thanks.

K

[Monika Gause]

It's always dangerous to edit crucial application ressources when you're not sure if you know what you're doing. I don't know about your level of expertise and so I felt the need to add this piece of information.

[Kim Hi]

Alright. I suppose my point is a littlebit that we actually shouldn't need to edit crucial applications in order to do this. (It should be a simple option). But thanks for suggesting it anyway.

[Lord McSquash]

I need to do work, NOT WASTE TIME HACKING MY APPLICATIONS

[Doug A Roberts]

I keep meaning to do this, so this topic reminded me to knock up my own throwback version.

There are three files, presumably for different screen resolutions, that you need to replace in the Support files > Contents > Windows folder if you want your own.

[Kim Hi]

It works for me in Illustrator to just remove the three splash.png files, but for Photoshop it seems to be different. Again, I find it amazing (and not in a good way) that this is not something we simply get to choose.

[Monika Gause]

Have you ever looked at the preferences dialogs for applications like Inkscape? There are pages over pages over pages and then you scroll down endlessly to set myriads of options. This is awesome if you want full control and this is literally the only application you ever use so you can learn all those options by heart. For an app like Illustrator and users who only use it from time to time an option like this only fills up precious space that causes you to overlook more important options. You have now found out how to do it, and it seems to work, so why not have it that way? BTW: the startup screen has important information in it, since it tells you what the app is doing at the moment. This can help in case of crashes during the launch process.

[Kim Hi]

I don't think it's such a big thing to ask to be able to disable the splash screen. OR simply that the splash screen comes without another artists illustration. For examples of the lengths people apparently are willing to go to be able to avoid them, see for instance this thread: https://community.adobe.com/t5/Photoshop/Splash-Screen-CC-19-00-Release/m-p/9414461#M120577

or for an example of a similar (and now gone) dialog option, this thread: https://community.adobe.com/t5/Get-Started/How-to-disable-the-Welcome-Screen-in-CC-2019/m-p/10203785

You can always find the information you need by selecting "About [software name]" in the File menu.

[Doug A Roberts]

I'd imagine the developers never really thought about it. I'd never really thought about it. Software has splash screens, icons, other graphics. You turn on Windows or Mac OS, you see icons and animations. It's hard to imagine caring to get rid of it.

[Kim Hi]

There's an apple logo when I turn on Mac OS and a horizontal bar that fills up. I'd argue that this is less intrusive than having to look at someone elses figurative illustration or photo collage. I've used Adobe software since the 90's. Their splash screens have never been as intrusive as they are now (in my humble opinion!). Again, judging from the threads above, I am not alone in this. (None of the other software I use on a regular basis have illustrations on their splash screens, most of them have only color and text. Some of them have no splash screen.)

[Monika Gause]

So is this about the artwork being "other peoples' work"? There are millions of Illustrator users out there. I'd suggest you put your feature requeston uservoice and then let's see how many people care enough. I enjoy the splash screens. I don't like all those artworks, but congrats to the people who made it there. And should I not like one of them, then I know how to change it.

[Kim Hi]

I don't mind seeing other people's work. And yes, congrats to them. I don't see what that has to do with what I'm asking. It still seems unreasonable to me.

[Monika Gause]

Post your feature request on uservoice. That is the platform the engineers use to track requests and bugs. It makes no sense discussing it in this forum. Post the URL of your feature request here and then see how many votes you get.

[Kim Hi]

Like you point out, there's a workaround for Illustrator. It's not an 'official' one, but it works. I'd imagine a lot of pepople go for that solution and forget about it. But for Photoshop for instance, there is apparently no such workaround. Is there a place to put feature requests that are platform wide?

[Monika Gause]

For Photoshop post it in the forum and tag it "Feature request" https://community.adobe.com/t5/Photoshop/bd-p/photoshop

[Kim Hi]

Thanks!