Another situation that causes InDesign files to become damaged

[james treacletart]

I have found another reason that causes InDesign files to become damaged and therefore unable to be saved, beyond the reasons stated in the "Identify and troubleshoot file issues" page at https://helpx.adobe.com/indesign/kb/troubleshoot-file-issues.html.

At my company we use the Box cloud service, and I use the Box Drive application to synchronise my files with the cloud service on my Windows 10 laptop. Our internet service is not fast (~ 20 BPS) and has frequent periods of congestion and slow responses: that might be a contributing factor too.

I have found the using InDesign with documents located in synchronised Box folders frequently results in damaged files that cannot be saved or recovered. I transferred all my files to a folder on my solid state hard disk drive the the problems did not recur.

So,  I suggest Adobe people add this possible explanation to their help page listed above. I have not checked other cloud services to see if similar problems occur with them.

[Willi Adelberger]

Let InDesign time to synchronize. In my experience those files which have been indicated as damaged were ok if I turned on the computer which were the last where the files have been edited.

To make the whole thing more stable, make smaller files and never embed linked files, use save as… instead of only save and avoid EPS.

[james treacletart]

Hi Willi
First, I had already adopted the practices you advocated. The file sizes were less than 5 MB at the time and all graphics were linked, not embedded.

The problem prevents you from saving the file you have been working on so there is no possibility of recovery later.

I am hoping that the Adobe people will add this to the list of possible causes for damaged files and advise, as a solution, to work with files on one's local hard drive which are not being sync'd with a cloud service. I'm not sure how to get that message to the Adobe people. If you know, let me know.

Thanks for the comment.

[rob day]

Does it happen if you use Adobe’s cloud server? Try saving your project into your user Creative Files Folder and test whether there are any corruption problems with their cloud sync’ing.  As Uwe suggests DropBox’s SmartSync feature is a known problem and Adobe probably can’t do anything about that.

[Laubender]

"I have not checked other cloud services to see if similar problems occur with them."

Hi James,

I found Dropbox very reliable when working with InDesign.

One thing to note: do not use the SmartSynch feature of Dropbox.

Im on Windows 10.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )