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March 24, 2008

Recovering a Corrupt AI File

Corruptfile_2

Have you ever worked on a design in Adobe Illustrator only to try opening it later and discover it's corrupt? Hours of work go down the drain, yet there is a ray of hope to crack open that file once again.

This will work in Adobe Illustrator 10 and up (but try it in older versions - it may also work.)

Requires Acrobat (not just the Reader).

Works on (and was tested in) Illustrator version 10 and all CS versions.

>Open the corrupt file in Acrobat.
>Take the arrow tool.
>Click on any element or text in the document.
>Just move the object by hitting one of the directional arrows on your keyboard.
>File, Save.

>Open the file in Illustrator.
>It will say 'this file has been modified outside of Illustrator' or something to that effect. it will ask if you want to keep changes.
>Say 'Yes' (or OK)

Your file will open virtually intact!

(Postscript: this tip was originally posted on Behance.net in the Tip Exchange section. Go ahead and give it a thumbs up if you found it useful! And, don't forget to spread the word - it can save hours of work and frustration for any designer.)

 

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Wow, that is so helpful! Definitely good to know.

It's probably the version of Acrobat that matters, not that of Illustrator.

Very helpful, thank you!

Does this work only when the ai file had been saved with PDF content activated?

Nathan - I've never paid attention to PDF content activation when saving Illustrator format files. It's definitely worth a try, though if you ever get into this situation and nothing works.

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