• Global community
    • Language:
      • Deutsch
      • English
      • Español
      • Français
      • Português
  • 日本語コミュニティ
    Dedicated community for Japanese speakers
  • 한국 커뮤니티
    Dedicated community for Korean speakers
Exit
3

could not save because write access was not granted (Mac OS)

Explorer ,
Oct 01, 2010 Oct 01, 2010

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

I keep getting the above error when working off of my xserve in photoshop. It is new in CS5 which we have recently upgraded to. Several people at my office are getting it. Sometimes it displays a random name with afp in front of it (I assume it is the temp name when photoshop is swapping out the new file for the old file.) It only seems to happen with psd and psb files. I have write access to the volume in question and it doesn't matter if I am the only one accessing the folder or not. I can save as and it seems to work; but it does delete the file.

Very frustrating. Anybody have any ideas? My IT guys are struggling with it, and one of them used to work on the Flash team as well as at Apple.

Views

397.5K

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines

correct answers 1 Correct answer

Adobe Employee , Jun 06, 2013 Jun 06, 2013

Hi everyone,

The recent Mac OS X 10.8.4 released yesterday has specifically named the following fix:

  • Resolves an issue saving files to an Xsan volume from certain applications

referenced from this Apple KB article. http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5730

If you are still experiencing this issue, please update to 10.8.4 and then re-test in your environment. Please let us know if you are still experiencing issues.

The KB article also mentions this fix:

  • A fix for an issue that may prevent changes to files mad
...

Votes

Translate

Translate
Adobe
replies 492 Replies 492
Community Beginner ,
May 07, 2012 May 07, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Is it just a normal Firewire or USB drive -- not connected by ethernet nor by wireless but only using a Firewire or USB cable?

If you are not using ethernet or wireless, are the permissions OK? -- do you have write permissions for the file on external?

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
May 07, 2012 May 07, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

The drive is USB and connected by a cable.  Where do I look for the permissions for ethernet or wireless and for permission to write for the file on the external? 

Thanks.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Community Beginner ,
May 07, 2012 May 07, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Click on the file on the external drive to select it and choose "get info" from the file menu, look under sharing and permissions (click little triangle to show sharing an permissions if needed) then make sure that YOU have read and write permission.

You should be able to click on the items in the Privelge column to select read & write for yourself. If it says you don't have permission to change the setting, then you may need to log in as an admin using an admin account (assuming You are not an admin).

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Engaged ,
May 08, 2012 May 08, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

USB and Ethernet have nothing to do with each other.

If you normally work off the external USB drive, and have no real reason to have permissions on it, do this:

Highlight the drive's icon on your desktop and press Command+I (Get Info). You will get this dialogue box:

Screen shot 2012-05-08 at 7.20.01 AM.png

Click the lock on the lower right. This will cause your admin password dialogue box to open. Enter your admin name and password. This will unlock the settings. Then you can put a check mark on the box at the bottom next to Ignore ownership on this volume. Close the Get Info box.

With no restrictions, you will never see another message about permissions on that drive.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Guest
May 08, 2012 May 08, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

You should also check the format of the external drive. Unless you install MacFuse, Mac OS cannot write to NTFS drives. You can only access NTFS as read-only with a plain installation of OS X.

Have you ever been able to write to this external drive?

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
May 07, 2012 May 07, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

That sounds more like you just had a real permissions problem - not a mystery problem.

You can give yourself read/write permission on the drive, or ignore all permissions on the external drive.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Community Beginner ,
May 16, 2012 May 16, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

"Adobe specifically does not support saving over the network. Adobe has a product called Version Cue specifically for managing shared files and file versioning."

This has been our mantra to all of our Adobe CS customers. If you work directly off the server otherwise, this stuff will happen.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
Jun 01, 2012 Jun 01, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

First of all, I personally would like to thank Chris for his continual patience with this topic.  Over the years, across different version and file servers (all of our servers are nfs automounts), we have intermittently seen file corruption and we all know how frustrating this can be, I believe Chris is as frustrated as us and putting this issue to bed would be fantastic for all.  As Chris suggests this is an OS bug, I can understand how it can be incredible hard to work around this with an effective solution for a software provider.  I would suggest that maybe the best solution would be a good check-in/check-out system inside of Photoshop and I'm not talking about one that file locks, this just unnecessarily complicates the situtation.

What I'm suggesting is PS having the ability to save the files locally for you and all subsequent file use and saving is handled locally.  At some point, inside PS, you may choose to resubmit (copy the files back) to the server, keeping the local copies.  So we no longer are working with a temporary local copies that are deleted immediately after a save, but actual visible copies.  Preferences could allow for where to save the files and maybe even how long to keep these copies for.  A failed submission back to server wouldn no longer matter; the user still has their local copy, untouched.  The check-in/out system will track where files were opened and default to resubmit back to the same location.

With little effort, I can add another drive inside a Mac Pro to allow for multiple local copies with a retention period, but I can't repair a corrupt file.

We try to persuade our user base to manually do this process, but often the files wont get saved back for a day or two or they may ignore the advice as they want to make sure that the saved versions are always on the server and so work directly from the server.  With a simple resubmission window, I could see our users regularly saving files back to servers and having a much happier experience overall, with minimal risk.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Community Beginner ,
Jun 01, 2012 Jun 01, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

From what I've read, Photoshop CS6 has auto-recovery, so it does save a local copy of the file as backup, no?

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
May 24, 2012 May 24, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Provlem solved for us today if anyone is still looking.

We had the same issue working on an iMac connected to a Windows file server. The issue was magically fixed when I joined the iMac to the windows domain. It would appear that photoshop is opening the file using the local user permissions as opposed to the remote user permissions used to connect to the server. When the file is saved, photoshop deletes the file, as stated above, but then can't write the new file to the server as the local permissions do not have permission to write to the server.

I don't know if this is the same issue on xserve, but I am guessing that the core of the problem is the same.

Good Luck

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
LEGEND ,
May 24, 2012 May 24, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

You can move your Preferences window down on your computer by using the keyboard:

Alt-Space -> M ( -> down-arrow multiple times) -> Enter

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
Jul 10, 2012 Jul 10, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Ok, I can 100% reproduce the problem

Here's the pattern I've found:

1. We have a network share in our studio using AFP protocol

2. A coworker creates a photoshop file

3. I then either open - or copy then open - that file.

4. If i then save the file again from Photoshop, I get the dreaded

Could not save “blablabla.psd” because write access was not granted.

and the original file is gone from the filesystem.

5. but only if that file's preview is currently displayed in my Finder's window.

If I click away from the file so that the preview is not visible then it works fine, or if I use a different finder view that doesn't have previews, like the List view, then it is also fine. As soon as I switch back to having the file's preview visible then it happens again.

Additional notes:

* If I manage to go past the step 4 and save successfully (by clicking away from the preview or using a different view), then I can switch back to the preview mode again and no further problem occurs.

* There is no issues if I'm editing one of my own files

So Adobe, is there anything else I can do to help (logs, tracing or what-not) since I can reproduce it at will?

Configuration is:

* Photoshop CS 5 12.1 (has been reported by others with 5.5)

* Lion Client 10.7.3

* Lion Server 10.7.4

* AFP Share with working ACL layer on top (User based permissions, full control)

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Jul 10, 2012 Jul 10, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

That particular problem we think we have a handle on (or at least have documented the bug well enough that Apple should be able to fix it).

We tried some work arounds for it in CS6 (to avoid deleting files and recover more gracefully).

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
Jul 10, 2012 Jul 10, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Ahh, thanks Chris. Hadn't realised it was covered (so much noise around it).

Is Apple giving any ETA?

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Jul 10, 2012 Jul 10, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

We can't talk about Apple's bug status too much.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
Jul 10, 2012 Jul 10, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Right-o.

Thanks for the update

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
New Here ,
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

yet another ben,

There a couple things you can do to get some data on what is happening:

1. Run fs_usage to get the file system calls as they are happening

Run it from the Terminal when you are done with the operation Ctrl-C will stop output

This first one might be a bit noisy but will get everything (-w is for Wide so nothing is truncated)

sudo fs_usage -w -f filesys

This one will only spit out lines containing Phtoshop (case insensitive) but who knows might miss some other interaction with Finder:

sudo fs_usage -w -f filesys | grep -i Photoshop

It'd be best if you can quit all other apps so the file system calls are only from Finder and Photoshop

2. You could also try Activity Monitor in Applications/Utilities, find Photoshop in the process list, double click to get info on the process, there is a Sample button that will do a call graph of all function calls by Photoshop for about 10 seconds after you press it, click it then quickly do the save operation. The data might be interesting to see here, however will probably be quite lengthy so a zip of the files is probably better than a long post

3. Once you have this data, and you done a great job with steps to repeat is file this bug as quickly as possible with Apple and then try and get as many other people to file it, start a campaign!

To file a bug report with Apple you register as a developer (free), here's all the info:

https://developer.apple.com/support/resources/bug-reporting.html

ALSO post the same bug report at Open Radar, this has the affect of getting it noticed and others can also light a fire under Apple to fix it:

http://openradar.appspot.com

Apple's Bug Reporter is sort of a "black hole" in that you can't see if there are similar bugs that have been filed, and they don't always give you feedback, sometimes a "Duplicate Bug" or asking for more info, so that's why Adobe can't comment, because they probably don't have any info on the status of the bug either (although techinically a bug report is under NDA). Apple always contends that its the volume of reports that matter and that will get its attention. 10.7.5 will probably be the last 10.7 release and it's in its 2nd beta so this really is the last hope of getting it fixed in 10.7! Otherwise if they do fix it, it will be in 10.8, just as Adobe has perhaps fixed it, but only for CS6 (not CS 5.5), so if you want it fixed without requiring an update of either OS or CS, file that bug and publicize it. I found a nasty Finder ACL duplication bug and was actually able to get it fixed in 10.6.8, even though it was fixed in 10.7, because I made a stink in my blog, had others mention it in theirs, filed a bug with Apple and open radar as well, so it can be done! Hope you can do the same! Good luck!

Joel Bruner

aka brunerd

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Guest
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

All  solutions, theories or speculations about a fix are a complete waste of time. I do find it entertaining to read some of them, but a total waste of effort on everyone's part. There is no .plist file to delete or preference to tweak. This is an Adobe problem with how Photoshop opens files from a network drive and a problem that came with the latest Creative Suite 5.5 version. I have been using Photoshop for 20 years and have been working directly from an Apple server over a network for the last 10, and NEVER had a problem until I upgraded to Creative Suite 5.5.

Everyone should do themselves a favor and stop trying to come up with a fix. It's Adobe's problem, not Apple's. Apple may have changed the way it communicates from a Mac to a Server but Adobe must adapt to it. Adobe knows that the bulk of Photoshop users are on a Mac, so they need to get over themselves and fix their product.

For those just checking in, here is a horribly un-technical explanation of the problem and a work-around.

Photoshop opens a file into your RAM. The file that is left behind is an empty shell with all but a few bits of data left in it, one of them being the file size and modification stamp. When you or another network user clicks a file, especially in column view, Apple's OS generates a preview. This preview changes the resource data of the empty file that Photoshop leaves behind, and when you attempt to save the file, Photoshop freaks out and provides you with the error and ultimately nukes said empty file from the server, leaving only the RAM version. You can hit save again and re-save the file, but sometimes that isn't done and the file is lost.

The solution, TURN OFF THE PREVIEW COLUMN. By turning off Apple's ability to generate a preview, you are effectively solving the problem. Yes, I admit it's annoying and somewhat difficult to work with, but that's the way it has to be for now. To turn off the preview, go to 'Show View Options' under the 'View' menu and uncheck the 'Show Preview Column' check box. This will disable the preview for the file when in column view, thus preventing other network users or even yourself from creating a preview of an open Photoshop file.

This solution has eliminated all errors for my  company, as it's pretty rare to have two people attempt to preview or open the same Photoshop file, so for us, this issue is resolved until Adobe fixes the issue for real.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
LEGEND ,
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

garymason wrote:


Photoshop opens a file into your RAM. The file that is left behind is an empty shell with all but a few bits of data left in it,

That is absolutely incorrect.

-Noel

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Guest
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Noel Carboni wrote:

garymason wrote:


Photoshop opens a file into your RAM. The file that is left behind is an empty shell with all but a few bits of data left in it,

That is absolutely incorrect.

-Noel

I did say that this was horribly un-technical. I'm a designer, not a software engineer.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
LEGEND ,
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

No worries, but oversimplifying something to the point where it's actually wrong doesn't really help even non-technical people.

I don't claim to understand the Apple bug that causes this problem, but I do know that just opening a file in Photoshop does NOTHING to the original file, even though the file contents are loaded into a document in RAM.

-Noel

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

Gary - one person had a problem related to the open/save dialog and possibly the plist file, hence the discussion a few days ago.

Others have problems related to Finder and other processes holding onto the files.

And others still seem to run into the MacOS file system bug when saving to file servers without other obvious processes accessing the files.

None of these are Photoshop bugs.

Adobe can work around Apple's bugs sometimes, but Apple is responsible for fixing Apple's bugs.

Many times, Apple's bugs are in low level parts of the OS that cannot be worked around.

>> Photoshop opens a file into your RAM...

That entire paragraph is incorrect. Really, really, seriously incorrect.

Photoshop just reads the file, and does not modify it in any way when reading it. Your file is only modified when writing over the file, and that is the time when the OS file system bug causes problems on file servers.  Photoshop CS6 tries to work around this and make sure that your original file remains intact despite the file system errors (which we can't entirely avoid).

>> The solution, TURN OFF THE PREVIEW COLUMN.

No, that is incorrect.

That will reduce the occurrance, but not solve the underlying file system problem.

Other users can be browsing the folder, the OS can be generating thumbnails or metadata, or other system activity can still trigger the file system problem.

>> the bulk of Photoshop users are on a Mac,

That is also quite incorrect.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Engaged ,
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

I can verify that turning off desktop previews is not the issue. It doesn't matter if you're in icon, list or column view. Turning desktop previews on or off has no effect on how frequently the permissions or .afpdeleted errors occur. They remain pretty much the same.

I did try out the idea that maybe a space in the server name (the share point name) was possibly an issue. I changed the name of the share point from Server Files to ServerFiles. Believe it or not, just doing this has drastically cut down how often we see either of these errors. So far, only once since changing the name, whereas it used to happen at least a dozen times a day.

This using Lion Server, 10.7.4. Can't check to see if is has any effect on Snow Leopard Server.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Guest
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

I have the previews turned off and have for over 3 months, and I haven't had this issue since. It may not be the ultimate cause of the issue, but it does prevent me from getting the error and potentially losing files.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines
Engaged ,
Jul 11, 2012 Jul 11, 2012

Copy link to clipboard

Copied

That, sadly, is part of what makes all of this so frustrating. What works for one person or group, doesn't work for everyone.

Votes

Translate

Translate

Report

Report
Community guidelines
Be kind and respectful, give credit to the original source of content, and search for duplicates before posting. Learn more
community guidelines