Acrobat 8 Crashes On Launch
Although Mac OS X has excellent built-in PDF support, there are some jobs that only Adobe's Acrobat can do. The ability to combine existing documents, create editable forms, and encrypt sensitive data all make Acrobat an indispensable tool. It's too bad, then, that the application has such a checkered history when it comes to stability. Acrobat 8 Professional, for instance, often crashes right out of the box. If it's doing so in your environment, there are several ways to get things running smoothly again.
There's a known issue in Acrobat 8 where corrupt or improperly-permissioned support files can cause the application to quit without warning. The problem centers around Adobe's Updater plugin, which by default checks for software patches when Acrobat first starts and causes the program to crash. Armed with this knowledge, it's easy to choose a solution appropriate for your environment.
The simplest method of dealing with this is to disable the plugin by selecting Acrobat in the Finder, choosing "Get Info" from the "File" menu, and unchecking the "Updater.acroplugin" box in the "Plugins" section of the Info pane. This method will prevent Acrobat from quitting unexpectedly, and is simple enough to walk users through over the phone or email. Unfortunately, it doesn't address the underlying issue.
The next approach is to replace the Updater plugin entirely. Adobe offers a fix for the Updater Plugin [963 KB]. To install the new plugin, right-click Acrobat 8 and choose "Show Package Contents", then open the "Contents" folder and place the new file in the "Plugins" directory. Though the publisher notes this doesn't work in every case, it allows Acrobat to run properly in most environments with the auto-update mechanism.
Finally, in most large environments, the best solution is to remove the offending plugin entirely. To do this, once again right-click Acrobat 8 and choose "Show Package Contents", this time going into the Plugins folder and removing the file named "Updater.acroplugin". This not only returns Acrobat 8 to full functionality, but prevents future issues that might be caused by unscheduled or user-initiated updates.
Recommended Reading: If you're looking for greater control of the update process, Adobe offers patches for manual download, testing, and installation at its Acrobat for Macintosh support page. If you're looking for more information on this issue, take a look at the Adobe Product Forums or the Acrobat for Macintosh list at Google Groups.
