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whiteheat74
Inspiring
May 17, 2017
Question

Dynamic symbols: massive memory leak?

  • May 17, 2017
  • 1 reply
  • 779 views

I've been working on a very simple Illustrator file which consists of a grid with repeated instances of 3 linked dynamic symbols (circles with stroke and fill).

As I placed additional symbol instances Illustrator CC 2017 became slower and slower until it ground to a complete halt and crashed. This happened every single time I subsequently opened the file.

With Windows Task Manager open I noticed that the memory usage was steadily increasing to ridiculous levels while I was working, until it reached the system limit of 6 GB and crashed!

This happened every single time I attempted to work with this file. Restarting Illustrator simply repeated the process.

Anyway, I noticed that by editing each of the 3 symbols in turn and clicking the 'Break link' button this solved the problem.

If anyone else has been struggling with Illustrator CC 2017 crashing repeatedly you might like to try this solution! Does it help?

This topic has been closed for replies.

1 reply

Mike_Gondek10189183
Community Expert
Mike_Gondek10189183Community Expert
Community Expert
May 17, 2017

Did you nest symbols inside each other?

The Adobe programming team should really not allow that and have a pop up menu come up as Illustrator becomes almost useless with nested symbols.

W
whiteheat74Author
Inspiring
May 17, 2017

Hi Mike. I didn't deliberately "nest" anything but that may be what I did.

I created a circle with a simple outline stroke and fill and saved it as a symbol. I then modified this symbol to change the fill colour and saved it as a new (dynamic?) symbol. I then repeated this process to create a third symbol. I placed instances of these 3 symbols into the document dozens of times.

I thought the entire point of dynamic symbols was that you could go back and change one of them to affect all linked instances - i.e. change the circle to a square.

If this "feature" is working as intended, and commonly results in massive memory leaks and repeated software crashes, then it should never have passed alpha testing. Would you agree?

rcraighead
rcraighead
Legend
May 17, 2017

I thought the entire point of dynamic symbols was that you could go back and change one of them to affect all linked instances - i.e. change the circle to a square.

This is what "Static Symbols" are for. "Dynamic Symbols" allow you to edit fill and stroke attributes on symbol instances. But Dynamic Symbols have important limitations not present with Static Symbols. One is, they cannot contain live blends, a HUGE drawback, IMO.

I have routinely nested Static Symbols in CS5, without issue. The introduction of Dynamic Symbols has greatly confused/complicated the use of Symbols, in general (again, in my opinion) because Dynamic Symbols are the FORCED default and many users do not understand their drawbacks.

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