InDesign 19 working offline

[TibiTaebi]

InDesign is very slow when working offline (Win10 and Win11).

I compared the times while online and offline. Here are the results (first number online, second number offline):

Startup of InDesign: 15s vs. 60s

creation of empty document: <2 vs. 18s

closing of empty document: <1s vs. 12s

switching between two empty documents: 0s vs. 8s

opening of a not empty document: <1s vs. 25s

switching between two not empty documents: 0s vs. 25s

This makes it almost imposible to work offline. Beeing able to work offline is very important to us.

I hope this will be resolved very soon. InDesign 18 did not have this problem.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Are you sure you don't have something in your installation - fonts, hidden links in the blank templates - that is linked remotely? 

I have a similar problem, every time I get INDD files from clients - and there are links to their servers - so InDesign is trying to find / connect to those external resources... 

And by offline you mean - no Internet but with local network - or no local network? 

And what platform / OS? 

[TibiTaebi]

Hi Robert

By offline I mean no internet. I have local network. I work with Win10 and Win11 (2 different PCs).

I'm pretty sure I don't have remotely linked elements since the documents I work with are all created by myself. The same documents have no problems in InDesign 18.4.

[TibiTaebi]

It is interesting to note that if I am online when I start InDesign and then go offline, I can then open documents and do not have these long waiting times.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Sometimes, InDesign behaves strangely ...

[Manan Joshi]

I have also noticied some dependency of internet access for InDesign since 18.5 version. For me if I launched InDesign while I was offline then InDesign would be stuck with a interface with every menu disabled so it was practically unusable. I am not sure what is being done behind the scenes but something is going on for sure.

-Manan

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Maybe it's about working online? This new option to work on files in the cloud? 

[TibiTaebi]

Maybe. In my opinion it should be possible to work offline without any hassle.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Yes, it should be... 

[Manan Joshi]

Hi @Robert at ID-Tasker,

That could be it. However, if that is the plan it should be clearly communicated and also offline work should be an option too otherwise it's useless in my opinion. not everyone has access to internet all the time.

-Manan

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

Yes, it should be obvious...

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

What if you turn off:

[TibiTaebi]

No difference.

I also tried to turn off 'Check Links Before Opening Document'. No difference, still very slow.

[DBlass68]

I am having the same problem. Working with any document while offline became extreamly slugish as reported in the tests from the author of original message. Online InDesign works as expected.

As I work with sensitive information, I can´t work online for security reasons. I have to be able to work offline.
I too hope this will be resolved soon.

[TibiTaebi]

Thank you for reporting this. I already thought I'm the only one having this issue.

For me too it's important to work offline for security reasons.

I hope someone from Adobe will read this and give an explanation of what is going on in the background or better solve the issue.

If it is Adobe's strategy to only be able to edit data properly in online mode, then this is a feature, if not, it is an error.

I understand that most people are not affected by this behaviour, which minimises the urgency for Adobe to change something. It would still be helpful to know if this behaviour will be changed in the future. Depending on that, I can either accept it or not.

[Robert at ID-Tasker]

@TibiTaebi

I've mentioned / suggested it - but not directly - what if you DISABLE all your network connections completely?

It might not be InDesign's problem - but because of the way system handles network connections and requests? 

There is always a timeout from the system, when request for a network resource is reported as unavailable - so when InDesign is trying to reach something that isn't local - system is trying to reach it - but doesn't report it as unsuccessful immediately. 

It's like when you're using your Web browser - when you've your local network enabled but no Internet - you'll see a message on the status bar of the browser - with a website address or IP address - but when you don't have any network connections - no physical cable and WiFi is off and no mobile / cellular adapter - you'll get a "failed" messaged instantly. 

If you disable all your network connections - system will immediately report it as unsuccessful and InDesign will receive Immediate response. 

@DBlass68 - can you try it as well?

[TibiTaebi]

I disabled the network in different ways (unplugging, deactivating in the os and the both of them). They all show the same blue results (green and red from the first test):

It's somewhat better but still miles away from good.

The questions remains, what changed between version 18.4 and 19 (I didn't install 18.5 since it had a problem when closing the app).

[TibiTaebi]

The problem seams to be solved with the new version 19.1. I'm very happy about this.