"Learn More" dialog is killing my workflow

[Black Cat Imaging]

Hi,

20+ year PS veteran here, who is finding it super frustrated that dialog boxes no longer allow me to hit escape to get out of them. For instance, if I click on a layer to make a selection, I get a dialog that says "Warning: No Pixels Are Selected". A common way for me to see if there is anything on a layer, and if there wasn't, in the past I could hit cancel and the dialog goes away. Now it goes away and opens an Adobe Learning Page on my web browser. I hit CANCEL, not LEARN MORE.

If I click on a smart object with say the clone tool, I get a dialog, that has three buttons, OK, Cancel, and Learn More. If I hit escape, expecting it to cancel, it pulls up my browser, puts an annoying web page on it and then rasterizes my layer for me when I told it to escape which means Cancel.

I don't need to "learn more". What I need is to have photoshop work as it has for decades. Is there a way to turn this off?

PS 24.0.1

MacOS 13.2.1

[c.pfaffenbichler]

esc works as expected here (24.4.1 on Mac OS 13.3.1); have you tried using cmd-. instead? 

[gener7]

If "OK" is highlighted, just tap Enter on your keyboard.

[Black Cat Imaging]

Thanks. This may seem to be the obvious answer but this does not address my issue. Of course I could hit enter on a highlighted dialog. What I am asking for is a way to dissable an annoying "feature" that has disabled my workflow. Escape key is a universal, cross platform way to get out of a dialog. I don't want PS to launch a website so I can "Learn More" when I already know how to use PS. How would you like it if Adobe changed a common key had had it lauch a tutorial every time you hit it?  Even on dialogs with Cancel as an option is doing this. It's so frustrating....

[TheDigitalDog]

Something is wrong on your side: "Warning: No Pixels Are Selected", I hit Escape, and it's gone. No web page or Learn More is shown. PS doesn't launch any web page or otherwise. 

Maybe reset your preferences. What you report isn't normal, nor can I replicate it. 

[gener7]

Well I did bring up the dialog and Esc does work. I have 24.4.1 under MacOS 12.6.5.
Since these dialogs are hard-wired and there is no option to disable "learn more", you can try updating to 24.4.1 or see if a Preferences reset clears it.

[Black Cat Imaging]

Thanks for all your replies, I have updated to the latest version (24.5.0) and hitting ESC on some dialogs now works normally, but others it is still broken. Thankfully it no longer brings up a web browser page, it just makes an error sound and does not do anything, so I must hit Enter.  

I do not understand why Adobe has to make fundimental changes to the way PS has functioned for decades. And the ESC key is an OS wide standard function. C'mon Adobe, you can do better than this. You can add things to dialogs without changing the way things have worked forever, and still add functions. There are thousands and thousands of us who have been using your products for decades, who just want things to work as they have. Every time you change something that alters how things work, we all go through the process of tyring to find out why and some of us spend time here on this forum trying to just make it work as we expect it to. Time is money and in this indrustry, it costs me time where I am not making money to try to diagnose your UI changes. Enough is enough.

[gener7]

Have you tried creating a new account and seeing if the problem is still there?  If there is something in your user  account blocking normal functions, this would be a way to isolate it.

Also I was not seeing the new adjustments panel on 24.5 and tried the usual steps. signing out and signing back in solved the issue. May or may not work, but costs nothing to try.

Also look at this: https://www.macworld.com/article/224955/how-to-reset-a-macs-nvram-pram-and-smc.html

[Black Cat Imaging]

This is not a problem with my account or my PRAM.

[TheDigitalDog]

I do not understand why Adobe has to make fundimental changes to the way PS has functioned for decades. And the ESC key is an OS wide standard function. C'mon Adobe, you can do better than this.

By @Black Cat Imaging

What exactly did "Adobe do?" considering the Escape key works as it should and always has for most (many) of us.

[Black Cat Imaging]

Adobe is constantly changing UI functionality. Just look at these forums.

[TheDigitalDog]

Adobe is constantly changing UI functionality. Just look at these forums.

By @Black Cat Imaging

So in terms of the Escape key, no, they haven't. 

Some Adobe customers hate two things: Change and the way things are. 🤔

You do realize you do not ever have to update/upgrade your Adobe software, right? 

As for "just look at these forums":

[Black Cat Imaging]

This dialog used to say "cancel" in its second option, and when you hit ESC, it would do just that. Now it makes an error noise. So yes, Mr Digital Dog, they did change functionality of the escape key in some instances. I have confirmed this is happening on other peoples machines. 

[TheDigitalDog]

This dialog used to say "cancel" in its second option, and when you hit ESC, it would do just that. Now it makes an error noise.

By @Black Cat Imaging

For you, sir. If you read what was written, you'd see you have some issues:

[Black Cat Imaging]

Thank you, but you are not helping.

I get it, but this problem has happened, and changed since I have made updates, which leads me to believe it is a change Adobe has made. I have also asked others I know about this, and they have reported the same issues, and downgraded to earlier version. 

Maybe you are not seeing the problem on your end, but I assure you it is not an issue with my prefs. Regardless, this conversation is moving in a pointless direction. Thanks again, have a good day.

[TheDigitalDog]

Thank you, but you are not helping.

By @Black Cat Imaging

Sorry, the facts have ruined your day. 

Of course, you could attempt to reset your preferences and then tell us the results.

Or never upgrade. 

If your goal is to have people tell you what you want to hear, you've got the wrong dog cat!

[Creamer Training]

Don't you hate it when the cats and dogs are fighting 😂

[Nancy OShea]

Orange kitties are lovers, not fighters.

[TheDigitalDog]

 “Dogs will give you unconditional love until the day they die. Cats will make you pay for every mistake you've ever made since the day you were born”.

Oliver Gaspirtz

[Conrad C]

I have tried Photoshop 24.4.1 and 24.5, and I cannot make this problem happen on two different Macs running macOS 13.4 and macOS 12.6.6.

I created a Smart Object and clicked the Spot Healing Brush tool on it. Of course, I do get the alert message with the three buttons. But this is what happens:

If I press Return, I get the macOS standard action of applying the default button, “OK”, which rasterizes the layer.

If I press Esc, I get the macOS standard action of applying the “Cancel” button, which dismisses the alert and does not rasterize the layer.

If for the “Learn More” button I use the common shortcut of pressing the first letter of a button, in other words if I press the L key, then the Learn More button highlights and it opens the Adobe help document for rasterizing a layer. The layer in the Photoshop document is not rasterized.

All of this is as expected. Nothing seems to have changed.

If I try the Clone Stamp tool, the alert has only the Learn More and OK buttons, but again, everything is as expected: Esc does nothing because there is no Cancel button, Return applies the OK button, L applies the Learn More button, all Mac standard. Layer is not rasterized.

I can’t explain what is going on in your Mac except possibly some utility software might have been installed that is remapping the keys. But nothing seems to have changed in Photoshop itself.