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Participant
October 11, 2023
Question

Document presets are missing in Indesign 19, 2024 version

  • October 11, 2023
  • 12 replies
  • 7119 views

Hi,

 

Two days ago Indesign updated to version 2024 (v.19). The software reset all the settings but I was able to restore my settings (workspace, shortcuts, etc) except for the document presets.

 

Documents presets are all missing! I also searched in the library folder for previous versions but couldn't find them.

 

I hope someone can help me to fix this. Thx!

 

<Title renamed by moderator>

12 replies

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
December 14, 2023

Both Document Presets and Preflight Profiles are alike in that you have to take the time to save them somewhere. In my "InDesign 2024 the 30 Presets" report guide, I suggest to save them to subfolders you make under the en_US folder where all other preferences go to live. Under that folder you would make both a "Document Presets" folder and/or a "Preflight Profiles" folder. InDesign will not make these automatically. But if you do, the migrate feature sees these things and migrates them forward to your next year's version of InDesign (if you choose to migrate settings).

Mike Witherell
Steve Werner
Community Expert
Community Expert
December 14, 2023

Thanks, @Mike Witherell  Very helpful.

Known Participant
December 13, 2023

So does anybody know if I can get them back? I have 2 Time Machine backups but it appears that when files are deleted from your drive they are also deleted from backup. Apparently this type of backup only stores old versions of files you still have.

 

I'm just back after 6 1/2 weeks of sick leave and the first things I did was to update a lot of applications. All of my preflight presets are gone from InDesign and I have a book to send off to printing.

Steve Werner
Community Expert
Community Expert
December 13, 2023

I'm afraid that you're going to have to rebuild them. If you don't have a backup, no one else will because you no doubt customized it. Consult with your printer about what to be included.

Known Participant
December 13, 2023

OK, thank you! I was afraid of that. I have sort of given up asking printers about anything as they generally answer in a completely different terminology from Adobe's software settings. At least here in Norway where they will have their own traditional terminology using vocabulary from before digital desktop publishing. Oh well. I'll figure it out. It's just that these settings have evolved over time and been tweaked whenever something has gone wrong or almost gone wrong in printing. So for a few years now I have felt secure just using my presets. Now the nerves will be back.

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 31, 2023

Preferences and Presets, Styles, Automations

Migrate

Don't

Migrate After

1. Open Recent List

Yes

No

Yes

2. Workspace Presets

Yes

No

Yes

3. Menu Customizations

Yes

No

Yes

4. Document Presets

Yes

No

Yes

5. New Page Sizes

Yes

No

Yes

6. Autocorrect Presets

Yes

No

Yes

7. InDesign Shortcut Presets

Yes

No

Yes

8. Stroke Styles

Yes

No

Yes

9. Word Doc Import Options Presets

Yes

No

Yes

10. RTF File Import Options Presets

Yes

No

Yes

11. Glyph Sets Presets

Yes

No

Yes

12. Animation Motion Presets

Yes

No

Yes

13. Find/Change Text Queries Presets

Yes

No

Yes

14. Find/Change GREP Queries Presets

Yes

No

Yes

15. Find/Change Glyph Queries Presets

Yes

No

Yes

16. Find/Change Object Queries Presets

Yes

No

Yes

17. Find/Change Color Queries Presets

Yes

No

Yes

18. Transparency Flattener Presets

Yes

No

Yes

19. Print Presets

Yes

No

Yes

20. Color Settings File (if in PS & synced)

Yes

Yes

Yes

21. File Info > Import/Export Metadata §

Yes

Yes

Yes

22. Preflight Presets

Yes

No

Yes

23. Scripts Panel

Yes

No

Yes

24. Export to Adobe PDF Presets ‡

Yes

Yes

Yes

25. CC Libraries

No

No

No

26. Custom Style Mapping ^

No

No

No

27. Adobe Swatch Exchange

No

No

No

28. ToC Style Presets*

No

No

No

29. Trapping Presets*

No

No

No

30. XML Structure Tag Presets

No

No

No

Edit > Preferences

Yes

No

Yes

§ ... Application Support or AppData > Roaming > Adobe > XMP > Metadata Template
‡ external to InDesign, ^ copy/paste frames using Style Mapping, * document to document load only

 

 

 

Mike Witherell
Barb Binder
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 1, 2023

Wow! That's a great list, Mike. 

 

~Barb

~Barb at Rocky Mountain Training
Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
November 1, 2023

Mike Witherell
Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 31, 2023

I just completed an experiment. I upgraded one laptop from 2023 to 2024 in a careful and controlled way.

I made examples of all 30 presets/preferences. Then I compared behavior:

 

1. Allow migration of settings upon major version upgrade

2. Don't allow migration of settings

3. Edit menu > Migrate Local Settings

 

Previously I had always avoided migrating settings based on the huge volume of user complaints on this forum. To my surprise, InDesign successfully migrated 24 of 30 presets both under condition test 1 and 3, and also preserved all my preferences and recent files lists. Everything appears to work fine. Even custom Scripts were carried forward. As expected, condition 2 installed a new version of InDesign with really nothing brought forward. I was delighted with this comparison test. I learned that it can work.

 

Now it begs the question: What is going on with the notable number of users reporting problems with migrating preferences and presets? It leaves me scratching my head in wonderment.

Mike Witherell
Steve Werner
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 31, 2023

I'm with you, Mike. I have migrated presets many times and can't remember having any failures. I usually choose to NOT migrate preferences. I'd rather set those up manually in case I want to change anything, I can do it manually.

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 24, 2023

So just to re-iterate: This is how InDesign has always worked. About half the possible presets are lost because InDesign leaves it to the user to manually back them up. In saying "this is how InDesign has always worked", I am not saying I am satisfied with it. But it isn't just this version upgrade that us users have had to know these hard-to-see corners for manually rounding up presets.

 

I will say it again: InDesign automatically saves presets for some things, but many others are manual. A few are not possible at all. A welcome improvement would be to have them all backup and save in the same way, and all of them be migratable to the next version. I count 30 (~) places in InDesign that have presets!

Mike Witherell
daring_ninja98A2
Participant
October 23, 2023

You could try reinstalling InDesign 18 and then export presets.

Participating Frequently
October 24, 2023

This solution worked a treat for me!

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 24, 2023

For the benefit of others, could you detail the steps you took?

Mike Witherell
taylerm8040798
Participant
October 20, 2023

Same here! I've reverted back to 2023 (18.5) until this is fixed.

Participating Frequently
October 19, 2023

Same frustrations here...   Why ???

Fonts recently added: gone...  Favorites: gone....

 

Have they any idea of the loss of time people experience because of this?  NOT funny...

Participating Frequently
October 30, 2023

New Acrobat - nigthmare!
New In Design - nightmare!
Why Adobe hates users of Adobe software?

Steve Werner
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 30, 2023

Nightmares happen to people who don't learn their applications.

 

@Mike Witherell's explanations of the way presets work is right on. You just need to pay attention.

 

Adobe does not hate its users.

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 17, 2023

By the way, preference syncing went away around v15. Preference migration is the new thing, and it appears to continue to be highly incomplete, just like syncing was. I continue to wonder: why not have a system that protects all ~30 presets within InDesign?

Mike Witherell
Participant
October 16, 2023

Same here!! Total panic. I've dropped InDesign 2024 and went back to 2023 until this is fixed.

Mike Witherell
Community Expert
Community Expert
October 17, 2023

Did you read the above?

Mike Witherell
Participant
October 17, 2023

Yes, when I try to load the .prst file, I get an error that InDesign 2024 cannot find the printer drivers. ??  Too much troubleshooting. I'll just stick with the previous version until this is fixed.