"Unable to set maximum number of files to be opened" in CS6 trial, CS5 runs fine

[medgno_43]

Trying to start up the CS6 trial on a mac running OS X 10.7.3, I get the following message: "Unable to set maximum number of files to be opened."  After clicking "OK" on that dialog, Illustrator quits.  Illustrator CS5 runs perfectly, as does Photoshop CS6 trial.

Searching for this error showed other people having this on much earlier versions of Illustrator as a result of their maxfiles limit being set too low.  The suggested fix was removing /etc/launchctl.conf to unset the limit.

Running `launchctl limit` show my maxfiles hard and soft limits are 10,000.  I do not have an /etc/launchctl.conf file, and running `mdfind launchctl` doesn't show any other config files with that name sitting elsewhere (like in /private).  Finally, I've run Repair Disk Permissions.

If anyone has ideas on what I can do to get Illustrator running on my computer, I'd appreciate it.

[Ian_Kelleigh]

Thanks Nick. I couldn't find any of these files (and yes I knew to make sure the system files were visible to search in them). In the mean time I will keep using your script solution right now. It works and that's all I wanted. Cheers!

[Ian_Kelleigh]

Strangly enough, the problem seems to have fixed itself at some point. Maybe after a restart, not really sure. But my preferences were all reset which is fine, but now I don't have to use that terminal command.

[DavidVaseekaran]

Thought I'd consolidate the useful replies to the OP, and add the inputs I've received form the Illustrator Engineering team.

On Mac OS, Illustrator usually launches with normal user account permissions (non-privileged). To maximize performance, Illustrator tries to increase the maximum number of files to be opened.  Mac OS does not restrict or limit Illustrator from increasing the maximum number of files that can be opened. However, a system administrator or third party software may place such restrictions on the maximum number of files that can be opened by a process, by adding a system preference to configuration files.

When such a file limit setting is enforced, a process like Illustrator that is starting with normal user account permissions fails to launch.

The possibility of such a system preference being added to your configuration files is higher if you have installed SMART Product Drivers 10.6 (See KB article http://www.smarttech.com/us/Support/Browse+Support/Support+Documents/KB3/146595.aspx). But, here's a procedure to isolate and fix the problem even if it is not SMART product drivers that tweaked this system preference.

You need to first check for the file limit system preference, and then try solution 1 or 2.

Check if your computer has this system preference:

1. Check if these files exist in your system:

   •     /etc/launchd.conf,
   •     $HOME/.launchd.conf
   •     /etc/sysctl.conf.
   

2. If you find any of the files listed above, check for a setting like:

limit maxfiles

Solution 1: If the system preference exists on your computer:

1. Create a backup of the file that contains the file limit setting
2. Open the file with editing permissions. For example, sudo vim <filepath>
3. Find the line that contains the setting, and delete it by pressing dd.
4. Save the file and press !wq to quit vim.
5. Reboot and launch Illustrator CS6.
6. If the error persists, there is a chance that this setting is being enforced from a different location. Perform the actions outlined in Solution 2.

Solution 2: If the system preference does not exist on your computer:

1. Download the shell script attached with this reply.
2. Unzip the file, and drag the launchAI.command file into your dock area. Do verify the application path; the command file assumes that Illustrator CS6 is installed at the default location.
3. Click launchAI.command.
4. In the terminal that appears, enter your user password, and check if Illustrator CS6 launches successfully.

If you don't like typing your password every time you launch Illustrator:

1. Open the /etc/sudoers file in editing mode.
2. Add the following line to the file:

   %staff ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL

3. Replace staff with your user's group name.

[brtdv]

Ivan David,

We know how to work around the issue, and launch illustrator with a shell script as root user. But that is merely a workaround and does not fix the issue...

Fact is that under my normal user account, I have NO file limit setting of any kind:

bert@bertbookpro ~> ulimit 
unlimited

But still I get the error message displaying the "Unable to set maximum number of files to be opened" error, while I have no files that exists where the ulimit setting could be present:

bert@bertbookpro ~> cat /etc/launchd.conf
cat: /etc/launchd.conf: No such file or directory
bert@bertbookpro ~> cat ~/.launchd.conf
cat: /Users/bert/.launchd.conf: No such file or directory
bert@bertbookpro ~> cat /etc/sysctl.conf
cat: /etc/sysctl.conf: No such file or directory

(which means that this solution also does not work)

THAT is the core problem, so there has to be a real solution to this instead of a workaround, so I can run Illustrator under my normal user account...

Thanks!

[Ian_Kelleigh]

I know. I almost feel like installing then uninstalling those drivers to see if that fixes it because right now I don't have any of those files sitting around.

[Brian_W12]

And on top of all that, you're sudo'ing into Illustrator which is insane. You'll almost certaintly run into permission issues if you create folders or maybe even files from within a sudo/superuser Illustrator.

[brtdv]

Indeed, I had some issues because of that when working with illustrator today

[anandcpatel]

It's still not working. This is a bit ridiculous.  It would seem as if Illustrator wants to set a ulimit of its own, but can't?  Any updates?

[brifair84]

I don't think this has been suggested yet.

I don't have SMART drivers installed and don't have the config files, either. But I found a solution that worked for me for Illustrator CS6:

Go into your user/library/preferences/

Delete/rename all of your Illustrator preferences files (there should be a folder) and also the com.adobe.plist file (note: this will lose your preferences).

Restart the computer.

This worked for me on multiple launches of Illustrator and I restarted a few times since as well - still working.

I know this is an easy solution, but it worked for me perfectly. Didn't want to have to launch a script just to run a program everytime.

[Ian_Kelleigh]

I tried this previously but I never thought to Restart the computer afterwards. For whatever reason, restarting after removing the preferences actually worked for me and I don't get that message anymore.

Evidently there is something else going on there with the Restart part.

Thanks!

[brtdv]

@bloodyelle & Ian Kelleigh: Unfortunatly, this did not work for me. Even after restarting I still get the same message.

[alonsoreyes]

this really work for me!

[alptekinsanli]

I guess this is the most up-to-date thread on this problem; for what it's worth, here's my (strange) experience:

AI was working fine on Mac OS X 10.7; after I upgraded to 10.8 ('clean install') I started getting the error. I tried everything suggested on the forums and Adobe's official help page, to no avail. (sudo-ing didn't work either; it wouldn't let me save anything?!)

Then today everything just went back to normal. The only change I made with the computer in the meantime was to re-install Parallels Desktop 7, and perhaps 3 restarts. There was no change in AI's behavior after the first restart. After the second restart, AI would run for only one session—after I quit and wanted to come back, I got the error, again. Now, it's 'back to normal'.

I'm not confident that things will stay this way, though. This isn't exactly a 'crash' either, so there's no report to send to Adobe. I guess the best we can do is to keep these threads alive.

[Ian_Kelleigh]

Yeah the whole thing is seemingly random for me too. I could try it one hour and I get the error, next morning I try and it works fine. It is some conflict with another app or setting that is limiting maximum open files and it isn't always from the SMART drivers.

[sboerner2]

I was getting this error randomly, too, but it seemed to be happening only when Illustrator CS6 was opened along with CS5.5 apps such as InDesign or Bridge. Now I open only apps belonging to the same suite at the same time -- don't mix and match -- and the error hasn't occurred since. May be just be a coincidence, but perhaps CS5.5 and CS6 don't play well together.

Steve

[Ian_Kelleigh]

Another thing I've noticed is that when I launch this without the error it seems like it's reading different preferences than when I run it through that script. For example, panel locations are different depending on how it launches.

[beaglemedia]

I was getting this error and didn't have any of the files or settings listed in Ivan David's post. I downloaded the file he provided and ran it to use Illustrator briefly, until an unrelated keyboard issue forced me to restart. After that, Illustrator seems to be back to normal.

So, if nothing else, try a reboot? I'll repost if the issue crops back up; it may be related to a process or app that was running on my system before the reboot.

[diegos77]

This works for me !!!

1 - Try deleting font database (I use Fontexplorer X Pro)

2 - Stick to Firefox

Good luck!!!

[Michael_Travan]

I was having the same issue and I stumbled into this discussion and i had no luck with the script nor with the file search. Then I tried bloodyelle solution, to delete Adobe preferences file (com.adobe.plist) : i tried this myself before but forgot to restart my mac after...this time it worked like a charm with the only minor issue of my preferences loss. Just a reminder for Lion users: by default library folder is hidden (user/library/): to reveal it just open Terminal and type:

chflags nohidden ~/Library

et voilà, it will show up.

Anyway, it's really sad Adobe could not provide this solution before and that they didn't even try to fix this problem, only suggesting a poor workaround which, in my case, didn't even work (Illustrator would boot but i wasn't able to save my files).
Hope this will help.

[Manish-Sharma]

The issue is fixed in the recent update of the Illustrator CS6 ,

http://helpx.adobe.com/illustrator/release-note/illustrator-cs6-0-1-release-notes.html

[creative_nick]

I also encountered this issue on MAC OSX 10.7. I tried many hit and trials and finally found a way to launch Ai, though it is just a workaround. I followed these steps:

1. I created shell script which can launch Ai. You can download this shell script from the location: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/47167182/launchAI.command.zip.

2. Unzip the folder and drag the launchAI.command file into your dock area. (Please verify the application path, since I have installed AICS6 on default location)

3. Click launchAI.command icon in the dock.

4. A terminal will appear asking your user password, enter your password to see if AI launches successfully.

5. If you don't like typing password  for each run, you can edit /etc/sudoers file to add a line "%staff ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD: ALL" . (Replace staff with your user's group name).

Please see if this workaround also works for you.

All the best!

[Ian_Kelleigh]

Creative_nick, that script works perfectly. That's really strange, what is different about how this is being launched versus just launching the app normally? BTW, during launch I get this error in the terminal window:

2012-05-18 06:57:59.647 Adobe Illustrator[69428:3e03] CFURLCreateWithString was passed this invalid URL string: '/System/Library/Frameworks/' (a file system path instead of an URL string). The URL created will not work with most file URL functions. CFURLCreateWithFileSystemPath or CFURLCreateWithFileSystemPathRelativeToBase should be used instead.

2012-05-18 06:58:22.879 CS6ServiceManager[69443:a03] *** CFMessagePort: bootstrap_register(): failed 1100 (0x44c) 'Permission denied', port = 0x1d03, name = 'com.adobe.csi.CSServiceManager.3'

See /usr/include/servers/bootstrap_defs.h for the error codes.

[creative_nick]

Ian,

This all is related to permissions that are avaialable to the process. When you launch the app with terminal (with the script that I provided), AI is invoked through shell and inherits the shell quota. It also gets sudo permissions so that AI is now able to change the limit of number of open files.

[creative_nick]

CS6ServiceManager[69443:a03] *** CFMessagePort: bootstrap_register(): failed 1100 (0x44c) 'Permission denied', port = 0x1d03, name = 'com.adobe.csi.CSServiceManager.3'

Ian, Did you deny participating in Adobe PIP (Product Improvement Plan)? I have seen such an error in that case.

[ergongervalla]

The solution with the shell script works perfectly.