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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator Apps
One of the most powerful aspects to UNIX and, therefore, Mac OS X are the permissions - but they can also be the most confusing. In our design firm, we have most of our computers set up for "limited user" accounts, not "admin user" accounts - for obvisous reasons. This has never posed a problem until we needed to use Illustrator's "Save for Web" command more than once. Illustrator would allow the first save, but do nothing on the second, third, fourth attempt. We were forced to completely quit Illustrator, re-start, and repeat this for every save - a royal pain.

After 45 minutes on the phone with Adobe's tech support (which was, I might add, very good), the issue was correctly diagnosed and fixed. It is an issue with the permissions. Until Adobe gets this into their Knowledge Base, here is the fix:
  1. Login in as the Admin user
  2. Open the Terminal application -- the root user needs to be enabled, see Apple's documentation if you don't know how to do this.
  3. Type su - root
  4. Enter root password (Note: this is probably not the same as the Admin password)
  5. Navigate to the Applications folder by typing cd /Applications
  6. Find your Adobe Illustrator folder and replace the exact name of your folder between the quotes, but make sure to include the quotes, as there are most likely spaces in the folder name, by typing: chmod -R 777 "Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"
  7. Check to see that the permissions are now correct (should be "drwxrwxrwx") by typing ls -l | grep "Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"
  8. Exit root by typing exit.
  9. Quit Terminal and logout as admin, then login as limited user.
  10. Open Illustrator and Save for Web now works perfectly.
Happy saving!
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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator | 11 comments | Create New Account
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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: zacht on Jul 15, '03 12:01:02PM

You should not need to enable root user. One possible change to the hint is as follows:

1., 2. as before
3. Enter this command line: sudo su -
4. enter YOUR OWN password
5. etc. as before

This is what I do whenever I want to be root for a while in the Terminal. I don't have root login enabled but this allows me to "root around", ha ha. Still, sudo almost always works fine, so...

... An even better change to the hint is to skip steps 3. and 4., and stick a "sudo" in front of the command in 6. There's no need to be root when you cd or ls (or grep). You still have to be a user who's allowed to use sudo, which (I think) means an Administrator (not a limited user).

Anyway, the real hint here is changing the permissions on Illustrator, not how you do it. Just thought I'd offer a minor shortcut or two.

BTW, if you do enable root user for this hint, probably want to disable it afterwards.

And is it just me, or is having write permission on an application kind of weird?

zach



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: deleted_user18 on Jul 15, '03 03:19:51PM

So Adobe sugested to give write permission to everybody for this application?

This makes me think Adobe obviously haven't understood what a multiuser system is. They ass people to make their OS X installs behave like OS9.

I can't think of any good reasons why a user should modify an applications package!

They should fix their programs instead of giving dangerous hints...



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: GaelicWizard on Jul 15, '03 03:59:17PM

you should never give world write permission to an application folder. nor to any other part of the system. its not kool.

---
Pell



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: Vent on Jul 15, '03 07:30:22PM

Having read the comments against altering Illustrators permissions - perhaps a quick fix might be to open the Illustrator file in Photoshop and save for web from there. At least until Adobe release a fix for Illustrator. This should, at least be faster than re-launching Illustrator for every save.



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: pmccann on Jul 15, '03 09:03:25PM

Wow! No offence to the original poster (really: seems the original problem has been solved), but

"I rang Adobe tech support because I couldn't crack a nut: the person on the support desk suggested that I
(1) call in the army,
(2) get them to bring in a Sherman tank,
(3) place my nut in the middle of the road, and then
(4) run over it."

And it worked a treat.

OUCH!!



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: mervTormel on Jul 15, '03 09:17:30PM

ha! good one, paul.

agreed. this is bad mojo. creates all kinds of potential security exploit turds.



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: bostmass on Jul 15, '03 10:29:34PM

As long as you are logged in as Admin, you don't have to be 'root', sudo, or anything else. The chmod command will work just fine for you without invoking either one of these. This tip, I can see, might be handy with Quark 6, which is now licensed per user, and not computer, hence if you have another designer logged into your computer, they won't be able to launch Quark successfully. There are a number of workarounds, but I'm not sure if this 'tip' is the right forum for it.



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: shark on Jul 16, '03 10:05:38AM
Thanks for that point Zach, this makes it much easier. I re-typed it and simplified a bit.

Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator

Here is the fix:
Login in as the Admin user

Open the Terminal application --

Type: sudo su -

Enter YOUR password (Note: this is the same as the Admin password)

Navigate to the Applications folder by typing: cd /Applications

Find your Adobe Illustrator folder and replace the exact name of your folder between the quotes,(but make sure to include the quotes) by typing: chmod -R 777 "Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"

Check to see that the permissions are now correct (should be "drwxrwxrwx") by typing: ls -l | grep "Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"

Exit root by typing: exit

Quit Terminal and logout and back in.

Open Illustrator and Save for Web now works perfectly.
Enjoy!!!

---
---
Shark

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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: ttv on Jul 16, '03 11:14:20AM

You could actually shorten the command to:

sudo chmod -R 777 "/Applications/Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"

Actually, Illustrator is not the only Adobe app having problems with non-admin users (though this one is new to me). If the admin installs the various Photoshop updates beyond the 7.0.1 update -- these updates consist of manually copying various plug-ins -- then both ownership and access rights will be wrong for the standard users leading to a number of problems.

I fix this using two commands:
sudo chown -R root:admin "path/to/app"
sudo chmod -R 775 "path/to/app"

It has worked with After Effects, InDesign, Photoshop and Premiere -- even without giving world write access. I also use this formula for apps not installed as root, e.g. Flash MX and MS Office X, though a few minor apps will not launch without world write access.



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Fix Save for Web permissions error in Adobe Illustrator
Authored by: deleted_user18 on Jul 18, '03 09:50:13AM

Same with PS Elements 2.0. Other users get errors that a file can't be accessed (the message does not say which one...) every five minutes.

Shame on you Adobe...



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Danger, Wil Robinson!!!!!
Authored by: discordantus on Jul 16, '03 05:45:40PM
I can see two things very wrong about this hint:
  1. You just gave everyone write permission to the application file, and
  2. You made everything in that folder executable.
A better command would be this one:
chmod -R a+Xr "Adobe Illustrator 10.0.3"
a+Xr means, "if it's executable by someone, make it executable by anyone; and let anyone read the file."

This way, the only permissions that are changed are the necessary ones.

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