Photoshop CS6 icons sometimes do not appear on Macintosh

[clinton_dyches]

Yes, this is a question.

I've been using my trial of Photoshop CS6 Extended for 10 days now. I have run into a peculiar problem - when saving a file Photoshop does not display any sort of icon. No thumbnail, no generic, nothing. It's not a huge problem, I can always open the image but not by double-clicking on the icon: it's just not there.

I'm wondering if anyone else has had this problem and if there is a resolution to it - or is it just a bug? I didn't have this problem with the beta version and I've repaired all permissions on my hard drive to see if that was the problem.

Any help would be appreciated.

Regards,

Clinton

[Rick Meikle]

FWIW, running Cocktail in its default Pilot mode (which includes emptying caches) corrected the problem on my system. On a purely logical level, even if the fault is with Apple, there must be something Photoshop CS6 is doing differently than CS5 (or any other app), or it wouldn't be the only app with the problem.

[marcPhotoNYC]

Rick, Thank you for your posting. Can you explain your solution to the less techy of us. I read your post and didn't understand it and very much want to resolve this problem as I need NEED my thumbnails.

Thank you.

[Rick Meikle]

I'm not that techy, either, Marc. Cocktail is a 3rd party utility that does much of the same stuff that Onyx and others do. It handles a number of "housekeeping" chores. To digress, I periodically run Disk Warrior (rebuilds disk directory) followed by Cocktail, usually before updating system software, and that seems to keep things running smoothly. (Little errors and problems gradually crop over time, especially if you create lots of files and are a robust filer, unlike most consumers who leave it to the system.) Anyway, Cocktail has a Pilot mode that by default runs what most of us will ever need done. It's simpler than the more involved ways to get to the same end. (I have no connection with Cocktail other than being a satisfied user.) You'll find it easily in a search. Don't remember if there's a free version, or how much the paid version costs, but it isn't much. The Pilot function is easy to find, and you just click run.

[Pace52]

Rick, I have obtained Cocktail and before I get myself in trouble... do I do anything  theDS Store tab where it asked to delete DS STORE FILES ? and or to prevent DS STore File creation on network vlumes?

[Rick Meikle]

You do not need to mess with the DS STORE files or any other settings. Just go to Pilot and click run. (I should add that I did run Disk Warrior before Cocktail when I solved the problem. I doubt that rebuilding the hard drive directory was the solution--the problems fixed were too few and more-or-less routine. What Cocktail does is more relevant to what the earlier posts were saying.)

[Pace52]

I am looking online at Diskwarrior.  So you are saying that Disk Warrior was able to restore or repair the existing files saved with PS6 on your Mac?  What would I generally use this program for?

[Rick Meikle]

A true techy can answer this better than I can. All Disk Warrior does is repair any errors in the hard drive directory, essentially the filing system for the computer, so it knows what files are stored where (among other things). It's like Apple's Disk Utility app, but historically has been more thorough. Directory errors can lead to various odd behavior by the system or apps at different times. You may or may not have directory errors, or at least any that matter much, and most users never repair or rebuild their directory (and most will use Disk Utility if they do), but that's a separate topic from this one. Just run Cocktail on Pilot and see if the icon problem is fixed. I recommend restarting the system immediately after running Cocktail. (I only mentioned Disk Warrior because I ran both it and Cocktail as part of my standard troubleshooting routine. Better would have been to see if anyone said Cocktail didn't fix the problem before mentioning Disk Warrior.)

[Pace52]

I did exactly as Rick said and ran the PILOT on my newly installed Cocktail and following that shut down my computer. All of the thumbs returned on the images saved in PS6. So that did it without Disk Warrior.  I still may investigate DW as well though.  Thank you Rick. Hopefully they will find a fix for this. It really through me into a loop.

[conroy]

Chris Cox wrote:

"...the OS is clearly failing to draw thumbnails, and that's not something that Photoshop has any control over."

The icon data of Ps CS6 saved files is different to that of CS5.1 saved files. A change has been made to Ps CS6 which is causing this difference in icons. Either Ps CS6 is writing the icons differently or it is requesting the OS to write the icons differently. If these CS6 icons, but not CS5.1 icons, are related to some intermittent problem when an icon is being read or displayed by the OS, Adobe is still responsible for making a change which lies at the root of this problem of disappearing icons on some systems. A simple solution might be for Ps to go back to creating icons the CS5.1 way.

[Chris Cox]

The change in the size of icons written was at Apple's request (apparently in preparation for retina displays).

The icons not showing up sometimes for some people is an Apple issue.

Please see post #41.

[conroy]

Chris, sorry for asking more of your time, but please clarify.

I manually request OS X 10.6.8 Finder to attach a clipboard image measuring greater than or equal to 512 pixels in at least one dimension to a file as an icon. The system creates and attaches a multi-resolution icon containing 5 images:

512x512, 256x256, 128x128, 32x32, 16x16 pixels.

Ps CS5.1-saved file icons are multi-resolution - they contain 4 images:

256x256, 128x128, 32x32, 16x16 pixels.

Ps CS6-saved file icons are single-resolution:

256x256 pixels.

You are saying that Apple asked Adobe to make a change to the size of icons in preparation for Retina displays. The result of that request doesn't make sense to me. The CS6 icons are no bigger, and they contain fewer resolutions. In what way does that comply with Apple's request?

[Chris Cox]

Because Apple's request was to just write the one icon.

[moglodite]

I'm still having trouble with this, but in testing I'm discovering some very interesting behavior.

If I create a file that has some imagery on the default "Background" layer, it will produce a column viewable thumbnail. When I add an additional layer to the file, the column view thumbnail is broken.

If I take a multi-layer file that has the broken column view thumbnail and flatten it and save it, the column view thumbnail is broken. So something tells me that somehow the file is now "thumbnail broken", but if I copy that imagery and paste it onto the default "Background" layer of a new file, the thumbnail is rendered correctly.

I don't have time to test all the crazy scenarios, but could it be that multiple layers are triggering part of the problem ? — hopefully this might be a valuable clue.

[conroy]

Moglodite,

The thing which you refer to as "column view thumbnail" is not a thumbnail which is attached to a file as an icon. You are referring to the preview of a file which Finder generates when Finder knows how to read particular contents of a file.

Finder does not know how to build composites from layered PSD files, therefore if the file contains no composite then Finder will be unable to provide the preview. If Maximum Compatibility is enabled when saving PSD, then a composite will be embedded in a layered PSD and Finder will use the composite as its preview. (A file containing just a single layer, when that is not the special Background Layer, is considered to be a layered file.) A PSD containing Background Layer only can always be previewed because Finder will use Background as a composite in that special case.

File icons, as used throughout the various Finder display modes, including Cover Flow, are an entirely separate thing from Finder's preview in the right hand column of column mode.

[uhanepono]

Hi Chris etal in the forum, I have no previews for just PSD docs  in the mac finder for a week or so now. I run snow leopard on a mac book pro that is about 2 years old. Oddly enough the trouble BEGan for me after running a normal maintainence script in ONYX (I clean the cashe about once a week or so). I just instaled the little "patch' from adobe but that does not help. I can see the previews in the com/4 view but in com/3, where I usually hang out there is no preview and pressing the space bar for quick look is the same, with no preview. I have read some of the posts below and have not found any solution that works for me. I see there is a sort of fued going on with apple's retina displays and CS6 protocols. Can you give me advise about what to do? It would be greatly appreciated. aloha, Uhane

Here is a screen shot of the problem

[conroy]

This is the wrong thread for problems with Quick Look and Finder preview. This thread is about icons not being displayed. Your image shows icons being displayed. Icons and previews are completely unrelated.

[uhanepono]

Thanks for the heads up. Do you know of a thread that would deal with this or should I start a new one? aloha, Uhane

[conroy]

I'm unaware of an existing thread although a forum search may reveal one - see the "Ask a question" box near top of page http://forums.adobe.com/community/photoshop/general?view=discussions

[clinton_dyches]

Chris,

Just to let you know, the problem has surfaced again in the latest developer release (12D65) of 10.8.3. I've filed a bug report with Apple but I don't expect, at this late date, that the problem will be fixed before 10.8.3 actually ships.

So I think that this thread will be angrily pointing the finger at Adobe once again  - I can confirm that it is an Apple problem, however.

Thanks,

Clinton

[Chris Cox]

Thanks for the update.  We keep talking to Apple about this, but they can't reproduce it and neither can we.

There has to be some triggering factor that we're missing (file contents, installation history, third party, or corrupt file structures - at a guess).

[6i]

Hello Chris,

I am not sure if this could help, but: If I am going to save my PS files on a .dmg image created with Disk Utility, thumbnails would magically show up again. A friend told me that .dmg images are NOT journaled. I hope this helps!

[William_Donelson]

I just got a new iMac 27" with 12D68 10.8.3. The MacMini never had any problem with that system, but my new iMac will not write the preview icons reliably now.

Running CS6 cloud software rental scheme from Adobe now.

[Chris Cox]

Unless you turned off all preview and icon generation in Photoshop - the icons and previews are being written.

The problem is that the OS isn't always displaying those icons/previews:  for some users, in some folders.

Please read the previous discussion.

[William_Donelson]

Chris Cox wrote: Unless you turned off all preview and icon generation in Photoshop - the icons and previews are being written.

The problem is that the OS isn't always displaying those icons/previews:  for some users, in some folders.

Please read the previous discussion.

I did read quite a bit. The .DS_Store files figure prominently, but I am not keen on deleting them often, which some people suggest.

I never had this trouble before CS6, and only Photoshop gives me problems - all other apps make icons just fine, so I think this is a combination of Photoshop AND Apple, neither one alone.

Perhaps I could send you a file or two with bad icons from somewhere on my system?

Perhaps there is a way to open the files in another program and resave them with icons?

[Chris Cox]

The file has the icons intact - sending me the file won't help. The problem is with Apple's extraction of that data to their own cache, or their display of the data from that cache.

And until Apple documents the exact nature of the bug in their code, we won't know how to work around their bug effectively (but we're making guesses and doing a lot of testing).