Pantone solid coated missing

[Sachin27185524c5pd]

Pantone solid coated missing in illustrator 2023.

[Ton Frederiks]

See: https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/kb/pantone-color-books-illustrator.html

And: https://community.adobe.com/t5/illustrator-discussions/pantone-solid-coated/m-p/13348709#M343771

[Monika Gause · Accepted solution]

Please refer to this: https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/kb/pantone-color-books-illustrator.html

You can still install a slightly older version and dig out the color books from it.

[Jolie218443837673]

God bless you!

[MarkGr1f]

This is a complete ****show!!

In my part of the world, every printer uses Pantone Solid C/U as a colour reference. Hence the reason it (was) included in every adobe print-related product. What the hell are we to do now? Has anyone actually tried the complete joke of an extension Pantone has uploaded to Adobe Exchange?? It's effectively a webview that forces you to pay a subscription. Slow, ugly, doesn't always work and is a nightmare for workflow.

I don't, in theory, mind paying for Pantone colour libraries, we already have their physical colour books. But for the love of god PLEASE give us a better integration!

[Monika Gause]

Please install the still available older version of Illustrator. Grab the Pantone libraries from there and copy them to your new version.

Locations of things in Illustrator: https://www.vektorgarten.de/illustrator-settings.html

[MarkGr1f]

After I calmed down a bit.... I figured that out 🙂
You can also find more up-to-date .acb files on the net.

[michaelh49405850]

what version of illustrator do I need to revert back to grab the old pantone books? I'm on 27.0.1 now. 

[Monika Gause]

26 should work.

[Brenda27786182b42q]

How do I find 26 - it doesn't show up as an option to download this verion?

[Ton Frederiks]

Brenda, there is still one older version of Illustrator: 2023 (27.0) that has the old Pantone Color books.

In the Creative Cloud app select Apps > All Apps > Illustrator > click the 3 dots …  next to the Open button >  click Other Versions and select 27.0

Go the Illustrator 2023 Application folder > Presets > (your language folder) > Swatches > Color Books > and make a copy of PANTONE+ Solid Coated.acb and PANTONE+ Solid Uncoated.acb 

Keep them in a safe place and copy them to the same location in the Illustrator 2024 application folder.

[7Mod2]

This is not good for us as a printer using this for year and didn't get this update.  Adobe should fix this issue.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

To be clear this is not an Adobe "Issue" this was Pantone pulling support from Creative Cloud and going it alone with their Pantone Connect plugin (a paid subscription). Your complaint should be directed there.

As a printer - there were many notifications given by Adobe prior to you updating your software. If you didn't pay attention to them, then I'm not sure what else could be done.

As others have posted, you can either subscribe to Pantone Connect or download and manually install the .acb books from previous Pantone offerings.

[scalkins22]

Maybe printers were notified, but I don't recall a notification either, unless it was buried in a massive amount of fine print. You're reply to that person was a bit sarcastic saying "…if you didn't pay attention…" People are looking to forums for help and assistance, not sarcastic comments.

[mtvessell]

I was able to copy the SOLID COATED and SOLID UNOCATED books from an earlier Illustrator version into the current version. I am able to access the SOLID COATED color swatches, but it will not allow me to use them within my artwork. This is such BS.

[Monika Gause]

Please tell us what you did step by step.

People on this forum are not responsible for whatever happened here. Just trying to help in our spare time.

[312creative]

It's August 2023, but I get help from new answers to old posts all the time. I've spent the morning cursing Pantone because client wants 2728C and Illustrator won't give me that as a Pantone swatch. When a client wants bright blue, dammit, they're gonna get it. So here's my contribution to this cause.

I'm on a Mac, so the Windows process will be slightly different, but here's the 3 steps to get the Pantone+ Solid Coated/Uncoated color books back into Illustrator -- and use it in your designs as if Pantone had never went the path of petty and made Adobe the scapegoat.

Note:
DON'T bother installing old versions of Illustrator just to dig into the files for a color book. It will work but it's a long, annoying process that I really wanted to skip. GitHub has a lot of Pantone color book files available to directly download.

Step 1:
Quit lllustrator if it's open. Then go to the GitHub page here: https://github.com/Autocrit/Pantone-color-libraries and scroll down to the file called Pantone+ Solid Coated-V3.acb and click to open that page. Click the text link in the middle of the page that says "View Raw" and the file downloads. Go back to the main page and do the same with the Pantone+ Solid Uncoated-V3.acb file. Repeat for any other color books you want.

Step 2: Again, I'm on a Mac so this part is where we may differ, but effectively this is the way to do it: put those files in your Swatches folder in Illustrator. Windows or Mac, that's where they need to go. For Mac, this is the way I got there (without trying to type a path):

1. Open Finder

2. Go to Applications (should be towards the top of the shortcuts list in the sidebar)

3. Open the Adobe Illustrator app folder

4. Open Presets > en_US > Swatches > Color Books

5. Drop the .acb files you just downloaded in there and that's it!

Step 3: Restart Illustrator. Now you'll see the new book options in your Color Books list in the Swatches window menu.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

Hi @312creative This process is already well documented including on Adobe's own help pages. I'm glad you found the workaround. My only concern with your method is you could be downloading malware posing as a Pantone swatch kit from GIT.

[7Mod2]

Great thanks.  

[Noeland]

I'm guessing that whoever was responsible for this at Pantone, pulling this license, had zero idea what they were actually going to be doing to thousands of print shop art departments who use the solid coated and solid uncoated swatches all day every day to work. Creating a subscription plug in was an absolutely terrible idea. I'm sure this was a bottom line decision from Pantone. I hate it. It's making my job incredibly difficult today. But corps do this. They do not care.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

Have you tried the workaround suggested by Adobe to install the color books from previous builds?

https://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/kb/pantone-plus.html

[Noeland]

Unfortunately that does not work for me. I have to use updated pantone color books for my clients, as that is what they are using. So I'm going to give Pantone Connect a real try. So far, it works fine. I hate that I have to pay for something this simple, but like I said it's a bottom line decision that I'm certain will make Pantone truckloads of money.

[Noeland]

Well, this is fun. I get that any new system will have bugs, but this is such a simple thing. Today when I tried using pantone connect I can't get the sign in to work through illustrator, while I can on the website. I tried to reset my password through illustrator and it tells me it can't reset the password. So a service I paid a lot of money for is not working on the second day I try using it. Pantone needs to rethink this whole thing. What a complete nightmare.

[Noeland]

Oh, wait, now the sign in on the website is not functioning either. Home run pantone. Home run.

[Kevin Stohlmeyer]

You should be posting these with Pantone so it can get some traction - you're preaching to the choir here.