Friday, May 22, 2015

A fix for the disappearing File Info dialog in InDesign

I’ve had a recurring problem for awhile where occasionally the File > File Info dialog box in InDesign CC gets “stuck” somewhere outside the bounds of my monitor. In other words, I’ll choose File > File Info, and the dialog box will apparently launch, because all my menu items get grayed out and I can’t do anything, but the box isn’t visible on the screen. But, since hitting the Esc key cancels any dialog box, I’m able to hit Esc and continue working.

But I need the File Info box for my work.

I discovered today that there is a file named “DVADialogPrefs.xml” located in the User Library folder in Preferences/Adobe InDesign/Version 10.0/en_US/DVADialogPrefs. (Hold down the Option key and choose Go > Library in the Finder to display the Library folder). Quitting InDesign, deleting the “DVADialogPrefs.xml” file, and restarting InDesign fixes the problem, and allows the File Info dialog box to display properly.

I suspect that InDesign gets confused about how many monitors I have, and where they are located, because I’m constantly plugging into different projection systems as I travel to do training and seminars. Hopefully this won’t happen to you, but if it does, at least you know how to fix it!

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Love it! I've had this problem too, and now I know how to fix it without force-quitting (and cursing a lot)

Unknown said...

I also faced this problem.Thanks for this post,now i can solve this problem.

Lindsey Thomas Martin said...

This works for Illustrator as well.

Renee said...

What to do if the "File Info" isn't in the File menu?
I found the "File Info" option in the Info Panel, but if I click on "File Info" here, it still crashes, even after delete the .xml file....

Etienne said...

hey keith,

thanks a lot for posting this - and keeping it online since then. it is a while since you posted it - but it helped a lot today when trying to solve this problem here (dialogue for "doument information in Indesign CC 2017).

thanks again,
etienne

Anonymous said...

Works and solved the problem! Thanks!

Anonymous said...

This absolutely worked and saved the day! Thanks so much!

Anonymous said...

Thank you! This worked for me today.