InDesign running slow over VPN

I know this is an old thread, but I was hoping that my two cents would shed some light and help is rectifying the issue for anybody that may experience it.

The main culprit will always be the internet connection. For some reason, having an internet connection whereas the upload and download speeds are equal, a VPN connection will operate in an optimal manner and will hardly experience any slow-downs.

A few years ago, I had an internet connection that provided 150/15. I was about to call it quits as it took a long time to open an ID file or save an illustator file. A couple of years ago, a telcom company installed Fiber in the area, and I immediately switched, not to a higher speed, but something similar; but this time it was of equal UP/DN (150/150). The difference in the experience was instantaneous. It was great. Never had any slowdowns ever since.

Well.... until I moved to a different house last month. They don't have fiber in the area, so I opted for a much "faster" connection (1.0G/50). That was naive of me, because that didn't help in any way.

My past experience led me to realize that for some insane reason, working with Adobe products through VPN, you need an internet connection that offers equal UP/DN speeds.

Hope that would help someone.

well internet, internet is the problem. here is why:
We work on leaflets about 28-40 pages, splited by 2 pages.
Every document contains 200+ links from small AI, EPS files to bigger one like 60-800 mb PSD files
If you connect to VPN, and you will try open this file from server, ID have to check every single file so it takes time.
if you are on local PC this speed is 30-110 MB/s  (HDD speed) and 300-2500 mb/s on SSD drive.
BUT indesign is not able to use SSD drive speed so maximum can be something about 50-80 MB/s 
even if you have TOP gigabit internet connection it will be always slower then local drive (i dont know why, but I tested it).
So you have basicaly two options:
1. buy big HDD to every computer which need work with this ID files and buy NAS station with doubled HDD size what you have inside your PC. then set Synchronize  PC to NAS and NAS to PC. 
you have to set this on all PCs. With this you have all "live data" on your PC and also on NAS ..an every other user have the same data as You. (but be carefull, here is some issues about "who have open this file" it easy to overide files to someone else because its hard to synchronize indlk files and ID is not abble to find if this file is open to somewhere else or not. 

2. and better option is:
take all the PC and connect them to server somewhere in one office, garage, basement... (if its possible) 
then buy very cheap PC or laptop...and connect remotely on these PC what are in basement 🙂
you dont need super fast PCs because you just need them for connection to the Super PC in your basement 🙂 

i work through remote connection over 3 years, and its absolutelly Perfect, 
all user can see if the ID file is open, no need to buy another big HDD, and you can work from everywhere. 
Right now i am on Sri Lanka, and i am connected to PC in Czech Republic (7500 KM)
and it is works from 80-90 % (depends on weather:) ) almost same like if i am on that PC in Czech Republic. 

Same problem here. And apparently still no solution...

Working with InDesign using a VPN is nearly impossible.

Opening documents takes sometimes over an hour... copying the file on the local HD and it takes seconds or maybe some minutes. But when opened the document still can not be used because beachball is spinning. The more linked files in the doc, the longer the beachball appears. And copying all files I may need to the local disc is absolutely no solution. I don't have terrabytes of local storage and I do not know in the beginning Which files I'm going to need.

Hello,

Same issue here, and it's not so much an internet issue as it is an actual physical location issue. I have high speed internet, use an ethernet cable and it still takes very long to open and save Indesign documents. Illustrator and Photoshop seem to be handling this better, but not always. I think it's because Indesign is always looking to update its links, so you're constantly sending and receiving data though your internet connection. Sometimes even copying a text block causes Indesign to start spinning... Hopefully something is in the making to be able to work faster. This problem must be global.

The only thing that works for our team is to work locally and copy all our files back on the server once when we're done. I'm basically manually syncing files. It requires some rigor, but even I will forget to upload things... Just make sure you have the same file structure both locally and on the server. That way it should update the links normally if/when you do return to the office where you can physically connect to the server again. 

Good luck!

Greg

Hi there, 

I hope your issue has been resolved. But if the issue still persists, please let us know so that we can assist you.

If any of the above-mentioned solutions have worked for you, kindly mark the answer correct. 

Regards,

Sheena

I think that what is happening may very well be what can be expected when using a company sanctioned VPN. I found this out the hard way. When the current world situation first necessitated working exclusively from home with my own iMac I at first installed a VPN and logged in with the correct company credentials. At this point I did not notice any reduction in speed. After a few weeks, however, my company noticed me on the network and told me that they would have to do a proper company sanctioned install. Once they did this (remotely) I found that I began having the same problems that you are describing. It was awful! Apparently the VPN used by companies also involves installing security protocols which are constanlty running in the background and certainly conflict with running programs like InDesign in any kind of efficient manner. In my case, though, I actually only need the VPN to register time spent doing jobs. Our files are all stored on a web based server that doesn't need the VPN. So, in the morning after booting the computer I simply quit the VPN program altogether and then only launch it at the end of the day to record my time. Full InDesign speed restored! I realize that quitting and relaunching the VPN program altogether (it doesn't seem to be enough to just not connect to it) many times a day in your case may not be an ideal solution for you but it may be the best way to handle it.

This is admittedly a long shot, but try adding your VPN to the Spotlight list of locations to not search (for Macs).

System preferences> Spotlight> Privacy> Prevent Spotlight from searching these locations> +

I have 2 options of VPN to connect to my work servers. One is a utility specific for the NAS to connected directly. The second is a Cisco utility to connect through the firewall. The performance of access including working with Indesign files through either solution is about 50-60% compared to local performance. IMO, this is the expected performance of VPN.

I'm having a similar problem that I'm trying to troubleshoot. I'm running ID 2020 and Mac OS 10.15.5. For me, the issue starts as soon a I try to open a file. With the VPN activated, opening a local file will invoke the beach ball for about 40 seconds. The document even be blank so it's not that it's looking to link up to files that are on the server. Opening and closing files will invoke the beachball while the VPN is on. 

There are so many factors involved, it's hard to pinpoint where the problems lies.

Make sure the designers are not in high-res view mode or in overprint preview.

If the designers are working from home, their internet speed could be a bottleneck.

If they are working wirelessly, that's a LOT slower than being hard-wired into the router.

As more people in the neighborhood go online, speeds often decrease. 

The server speed could be slow, especially with the VPN.

The server's internect connection might not be able to handle all the requests. 

Have you considered using low-res versions of the files, and using InDesign's Links folder to switch to the high-res images near the end of the job?