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2

Illustrator Copy & Paste not working

New Here ,
May 03, 2018 May 03, 2018

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I made a rectangle and tried to select, Copy and paste- it wont work.  It lets me select but when I hit Ctrl -the selection tool changes to "direct selection" and shows a little curved line.  Then it wont let me Ctrl C-Ctrl V.  I also tried to just select and go to the edit menu and copy and that will not work either.

I used the pen tool to make a shape and see if I could copy that and its doing the same thing...so I think its some issue with the selection tool.

I dont know if I accidentally changed a setting or how I can fix this, but its very frustrating.  Please help!! 

Thanks!

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correct answers 1 Correct answer

Community Expert , May 03, 2018 May 03, 2018

It sounds like you may need to trash your Illustrator preferences.

To do so:

You can try the quick way of resetting on a PC which is to hold down Ctrl + Alt + Shift when launching Illustrator and respond affirmatively when asked if you want to reset. There have been some recent reports that the window asking if you want to reset is not popping up but that the prefs are being reset anyway. If this works great but if it doesn’t you may have to manually delete them.

To do so:

On Windows 7 and above the

...

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Adobe
Community Beginner ,
Sep 28, 2022 Sep 28, 2022

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I had this annoying problem with Illustrator and nothing of the above suggestions had worked for me.

So I went to Photoshop's Edit menu, and selected Purge and Clipboard.

And it did the magic

 

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Community Beginner ,
Oct 31, 2023 Oct 31, 2023

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OMG Thank you! This did the trick after nothing else in this thread worked. I had to open Photoshop, create a new document, COPY something, then EDIT->PURGE->CLIPBOARD, then I opened Illustrator, and it worked.

Extremly disappointed by Adobe in this thread, not even acknowledging this bug. How is this not an Adobe issue, but an "issue with people's computer", if it's entirely caused and solved by Adobe programs?

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Community Beginner ,
Oct 31, 2023 Oct 31, 2023

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Well, celebrated too early. It now exactly works one single time after opening Illustrator.

 

I open illustrator. Copy one element. I can now paste this element as often I want. If I copy this (or another) element again, I cannot paste anymore.

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Community Expert ,
Oct 31, 2023 Oct 31, 2023

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The size of the clipboard is limited by the amount of RAM you have installed, by other apps running simultaneously and by how often you reboot the computer. Rebooting is good for your computer and above all it cleans up RAM.

 

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Community Beginner ,
Oct 31, 2023 Oct 31, 2023

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I am sorry, I take everything back about this being Adobe's fault (I cannot edit the comment).

It was AnyViewer causing this. (as per this user: https://community.adobe.com/t5/illustrator-discussions/copy-paste-not-always-working-randomly/m-p/13...)

 

Thanks anyway for the fast response.

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Explorer ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Hi, I went nuts for months on this. I tried all solutions provided on Adobe's forums but for some reason the bug kept randomly occurring. Finally on Reddit I found an actual solution. Quit all MS applications that may cause clipboard conflict, like Powerpoint, in my case.
Voit la: issue "solved".

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Community Expert ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Walter Bosello  schrieb:

Hi, I went nuts for months on this. I tried all solutions provided on Adobe's forums 


 

Then you must have overlooked some threads on the issue. Microsoft is mentioned on quite a few pages about the issue in this forum.

 

But there are other possible causes as well.

Since the list is not in this thread already, here it is. All these apps have caused clipboard problems for someone. There might be other apps missing in the list

 

  • Parallels Toolbox running with the Clipboard History
  • TeamVewer Clipboard > Use Shared Clipboard
  • Apple iOS device simulator from Xcode
  • Windows Multi-clipboard
  • Windows Clipboard History
  • Chrome Remote Desktop
  • Mouse Pointer Highlighter
  • AnyViewer
  • Pastebot app
  • Overzealous antivirus (Digital Guardian) as well as viruses that empty the clipboard
  • Vector Magic

 

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Explorer ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Actually I was about to correct myself as I did not see all pages on this thread (you know how forums take you directly to the "solution" skipping all previous posts...). hahaha sorry!

I think what happened in AI's latest releases something must have changed in the handling of clipboard. That's where the problem lies.
In my opinion the only temporary solution is to quit all other apps and leave only Illustrator running. that solves my problem, for the moment. I'm hoping future AI releases will give a more permanent solution.

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Community Expert ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Walter Bosello  schrieb:


I think what happened in AI's latest releases something must have changed in the handling of clipboard. That's where the problem lies.


 

The problem has been running longer than the latest release. And the other apps are not innocent. 

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Explorer ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Yeah that's probably true. I miss the good old days in the 90s when there were simpler programs and simpler computers...but printers were impossible at that time too hehehe.

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Adobe Employee ,
Apr 19, 2024 Apr 19, 2024

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Hello @Walter Bosello,

We understand that encountering technical issues can be frustrating. Would you mind trying to run Illustrator under Safe Mode (Windows / macOS) and checking if it helps? Also, try running Illustrator under a different administrator account (Windows / macOS) and share your observations.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

 

Thanks,

Anubhav

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Community Beginner ,
Nov 14, 2024 Nov 14, 2024

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This isn't solved for a huge amount of people so it's very misleading to announce it is 'Solved' in this thread and just adds to the frustration.

I've had this issue off and on for years at this point and it's criminal it's not been effectively resolved with the price of the adobe suite. It's totally random when it decides to copy and when it won't and there seems to be no logic to it to even attempt to troubleshoot it

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Explorer ,
Nov 14, 2024 Nov 14, 2024

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I figured out what I was doing wrong. Under the options in the layers
panel, there is a switch "paste remembers layers". I do not know when they
added that but it threw me off for a very long time. Hope this helps.

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Engaged ,
Nov 14, 2024 Nov 14, 2024

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That feature has been in Illustrator for almost as long as I can remember.  At least as far back as the year 2000 when I started using Illustrator for a living.   That's one of my favorite Illustrator workflow features.

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Explorer ,
Nov 14, 2024 Nov 14, 2024

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I guess I just never needed/used it until now.

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Community Beginner ,
Nov 15, 2024 Nov 15, 2024

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Yea unfortunatly that isn't the issue. It's a really weird one and I think it's mainly text. I can copy the same word 5 times then on the 6th it will magically decide to paste

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Community Expert ,
Nov 15, 2024 Nov 15, 2024

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tariqlikeminded  schrieb:

Yea unfortunatly that isn't the issue. It's a really weird one and I think it's mainly text. I can copy the same word 5 times then on the 6th it will magically decide to paste


 

Do you have anything from the list posted above?

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Engaged ,
Nov 15, 2024 Nov 15, 2024

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Yeah, that's the problem.  For me, the problem is about 90% solved.  I have a piece of software called Vector Magic.  When that software is open, Illustrator has problems with copy/paste.  As soon as I close Vector Magic the problems are resolved, 90% of the time. But 10% of the time, Illustrator will still fail to copy/paste.  I may have to make 2 or 3 attempts.

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New Here ,
Feb 13, 2025 Feb 13, 2025

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Здравствуйте! Долго бился в поисках решения данного бага, а именно проблемы  с буфером обмена в Illustrator.

Очень часто в работе использую Ctrl+X, Ctrl+F, Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V. Использую автоматизацию с помощью Actions. И эта проблема меня сильно бесила. Ни один из предложенных способов решения в данном топике не помог. 

Помимо Actions я конечно же использую скрипты в работе. И вот периодически в течение дня они переставали работать. Приходилось перегружать Illustrator, тогда они снова начинали запускаться.

Кстати, использую последнюю версию Illustrator 29.3.

Тоже искал решение данного бага. Нашел.

Решение следующее.

Надо переименовать папку Startup Scripts CC в папку с названием Startup Scripts CC.old

по пути C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Adobe\Startup Scripts CC

После переименования исчезли обе проблемы!

Буфер стал корректно работать и скрипты стали запускаться стабильно в течение всего рабочего дня.

Предлагаю к рассмотрению этот способ.

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New Here ,
Feb 13, 2025 Feb 13, 2025

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Забыл сообщить, что система у меня Windows 10.

И да, при каждом обновлении Illustrator, папку надо заново переименовать.

Работаю с этим решением уже неделю, испытал на двух версиях Illustrator.

Не знаю какая связь от переименования этой папки с работой буфера обмена, но она есть.

Во всяком случае на моей системе.

При этом тоже использую паралельно Vector Magic и Microsoft Office.

Vector Magic все-таки лучше закрыть при работе в Illustrator.

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