Incomplete or Garbled object

Bill Martin

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Oct 23, 2002, 5:09:11 PM10/23/02

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One of my users continues to have this problem in Illust. 8.01, OS 9.2.2.
Need to continue working on file, therefore saving and replacing as EPS is not an option. Need to recover the files.
Error message:

"Can't open Illustration. The illustration contains an incomplete or garbled object description.
Offending Operato: "userdict"
Context:

%%Creation Date: (04/10/93)()
%% Copyright: ((C) 1987-1996 Adobe Systems Incorporated
All Rights Reserved)
userdict

Candace Carnevale

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Oct 30, 2002, 10:07:07 AM10/30/02

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I have been getting the same error message except that my offending operator is "systemdict". I am using the Illus. version 8 as well. Have you solved the problem?

Douglas Habben

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Oct 30, 2002, 11:10:09 AM10/30/02

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Try reading this thread in the archives:
Scott Wicks "Error = "userdict"" 4/30/02 4:39am </cgi-bin/webx?13@@.ef83668/1>

Chelan

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Oct 30, 2002, 12:08:19 PM10/30/02

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Try the following to recover your damaged files.

1) Change the extension to .eps and try to place the file in a new AI file.

2) Run the damaged ai file through distiller and then open the resulting .pdf file back up in Illustrator.

It may or may not work, but it's just a couple of different way to try and parse the postscript.

Chelan

Ben Garrison

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Oct 30, 2002, 11:18:18 PM10/30/02

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I had a similar problem today. It involved an ai .eps file of a full color newspaper page I've been working on (due tomorrow). It contained graphics, photos and text. It opened fine yesterday but this afternoon 10.0.3 could not open it. The gauge would nearly complete...ending in the spinning ball of death. That is all. I had to force quit each time. Then I rebooted in classic and booted up Illustrator 8. That couldn't open it either, but at least it gave me the courtesy of an error message: "The illustration contains an incomplete or garbled object. Systemdict."

Well, I tried the suggestion posted on this board. I created a new AI doc--and since AI coding goes on and on, I typed in a single distinctive word in it that Microsoft Word could find. I used 'find' in Word to find my word. Then I opened up the 'corrupted' document. I copied everything below the same line of coding that appeared in the corrupt doc and pasted it below the same coding (that appeared above my word) in the new doc. (I never could find the begin layers thing that was mentioned here). I'm a graphic artist-- not a programmer--so I said to myself 'no WAY is this gonna work.' But it DID work. What a relief!

Also, I WAS able to open up the document in Photoshop. It would have worked when rasterized at a high dpi, but making text corrections after text has been pixilated is a chore. The reason I could still open it in Pshop is explained in one of the messages on this board, but some of the explanations are too clever and subtle for me. Still, I am glad I got the code switch thing to work...it saved me a lot of time. (I had backed up the file, but that was a just a dupe of the corrupt one--so much for that!)

Good luck.

Ben