Under Catalina, Preview app refuses to open my PDFs. Admittedly some of my PDF folders have a few hundred to some thousand files in them but cannot open. It just hangs for some minutes. I had this problem before with other OSs but eventually they do open.
However, using the old Adobe Reader (no longer works with the new OS) these same files would open almost immediately.
Anyone else have this problem?
The issue i am having with Preview is slightly different. After upgrading to Catalina, Preview opens my PDF files but the search function no longer works correctly. The search function in Preview will work 2 times when i open a PDF - when i try to search more than 2 times after opening a PDF, search will no longer highlight the searched string nor will it allow navigation of the searched string thru the document (using those search arrows). It was working just fine prior to the upgrade and this is a function i use often. I hope it is addressed soon by Apple.
Thanks for contacting me re-Preview app. I have to admit the search function doesn't work with me either, something I hadn't got round to trying.
Preview App in my view is preferable but even under the old OS (10.14) it still had difficulty in opening some of my files.
I have several CDs with family history records from various Family History Societies - some small & some very large. Its the very large files Preview cannot cope with and in fact locks up needing a Force Quit before you can use preview again for smaller files.
I had to install Adobe Acrobat Reader DC to enable me to use them and they open almost immediately, but the lay-out is not quite the way I would prefer.
Like you I hope Apple are able to fix, but considering this problem was reported to them some time ago, I wouldn't hold your breath.
I combined several pdfs in preview that now will not open in any other application. Also bugs in how the page numbers read. And when I select a page in the thumbnail view, it automatically deselects the one I chose and selects the next page in the sequence. Catalina is a mess.
I just installed 10.15.3 (19D76) and the Preview problems are STILL NOT SOLVED. How on earth can they break something so basic so profoundly? Why did they touch it in the first place? It was working!
Under Steve Jobs, whoever is responsible for software in Apple would have been kicked out of the company for this by now. It is unbelievable how quality is gradually but surely deteriorating in recent years. I have stopped telling people to switch to Mac because it doesn't "just work" anymore. Apps crash all the time. Bugs go unfixed for ages. Every new release seems to bring more debilitating bugs than new features.
Apple seems to be preoccupied with beautification. As the man said, design is not what it looks like, it's how it works. And right now: It. Doesn't. Work.
Apple, please stop focusing on nice-to-have's like Stocks on Mac and dynamic desktop backgrounds. Please focus on fixing the OOTB productivity tools like Preview and Mail we need to justify paying a premium price for an incredible product. I don't need another shiny release this fall, just please fix the current one.
I have confirmed the issues with Preview, in my current system, are not present. I upgraded my previous MacBook Pro and now I am running Catalina 10.15.3 in a new 16in MacBook Pro maxed out on the specs (64GB memory, 8GB graphics, 8 core i9 processor) and i no longer have the issues i was experiencing previously with Preview. I noticed Preview was working back in Dec when i ordered my new system and used Preview, but didn't want to post this until i had tested Preview with different files and under different scenarios to feel comfortable saying it was working. I don't know if anything changed in the application but i do know my system is a new, more powerful system, therefore i don't know if Preview now works due to the hardware upgrade (more memory or processing power, etc.) or if something actually changed in Preview.
I have had this problem periodically since a few weeks after upgrading to Catalina, and I have a temporary workaround.
Specifically, if I double-click any PDF file (or open Preview.app and then File...Open...), then I would expect a new window to open up with the PDF file showing, but instead I get nothing. Preview.app opens, as is clear from the menu bar, but there is no window, and the PDF is not rendered. Interestingly, the file does show in Finder under "Quick Look," just not under Preview.
The workaround, which I found on another forum reporting the same problem, is as follows. In Terminal.app, type the following command line and hit return:
/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Frameworks/LaunchServices.framework/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain local -domain system -domain user
Then restart your computer. This will fix Preview for a month or two, after which the problem will recur. I have had to apply the fix about half a dozen times since Catalina.
I hope that someone at Apple is reading this forum and will find this workaround helpful to debug the problem, which has persisted for an inexcusable duration!
I've added a new post to the community specifically about this issue of combining multiple PDFs. I've referenced back to this post as well.
See here:
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250759802
Preview in Catalina (19A583) also has problems combining multiple PDFs into one, changing the order of pages, numbering pages, and adding markup. Something is broken badly in Preview.
I am having the same issues. It’s forcing my hand to move to Adobe.
Same issue. Any fix?
Agreed. Clearly this issue has still not resolved yet. Disappointing!
Preview in 10.15 (Catalina) not working
