Preview is locking me out of my own PDFs, saying I don't have permission to view them even though I do

Hey, I know this is a late response but maybe others have this problem atm, so here's my solution:

Open Activity Monitor --> click on Preview --> click on "force quit". Then open your desired PDF and it should work 🙂

The problem has continued from 10.7.1 through 10.12.3. Quick fixes do not consistently work, but this works each time in Sierra 10.12.3.

Open Finder, click Go, Go to folders, enter ~/Library/Caches move all files to Trash

From Finder, click Go, Go to folders, enter /Library/Caches move all files to Trash

Empty Trash

Open Disk Utility, click Repair (takes a few minutes)

Log out user (faster than rebooting and just as effective)

Log in User

Despite being time consuming, this consistently enables Preview to open files successfully each time. On a side note, changing the view in Finder (ie Clean up by Date Modified) can reintroduce the issue in Preview.

I am having this same problem with some PDF articles that I purchased that are on CD. They used to open with no problem. I can't solve your problem with Preview, but I have found that these same articles open with Adobe Reader. I was then able to save a copy of the PDFs onto my computer. The copies opened just fine with Preview (or Reader). It is annoying to have to use this work-around, but at least it works and Reader is free.

Permissions are screwed up on your hidden ~/Library folder. In the Finder, go to the Go menu, hold down the option key, and select Library. Then do Get Info on Library and make sure you have Read/Write permissions.

I did as you suggested, but I already have Read/Write permission for the Library. Repairing permisisons had no effect. I still can't open the files with Preview unless I open and save them with Reader first.

Several people have complained about this problem on the forums since the introduction of Lion. I think that there is a problem with Preview, though I can't understand why it affects only some PDF files.

It is probably related to Versions. Some PDFs have a version and some don't. Preview is one of the flakier parts of Lion.

Maybe try again to reset Read/Writer permissions. Only this time, in Get Info, unlock the settings, click on the "gear box" and choose "Apply to enclosed items".

I just tried the 'Apply to enclosed items', no joy. I'm still getting the exact same error message. Hopefully Apple will fix this in an early update. Thanks for your suggestions though - I had never looked in that particular gear box before!

It's not an obvious permissions issue. I can double click the same file and it opens fine. The error only appears if I select the file from the Bookmarks menu. And then the bookmarks menu will work, for a bit and then not.

No, I think it is an issue with Preview being sandboxed (check the sandbox column in Activity Monitor: Preview = Yes). Sandboxed apps restrict file access to those the user has explicitly selected. My theory is that this causes the unfortunate side effect of bookmarked or linked PDFs not working. A simple test: open a file with bookmarks, manually open the bookmarked file and then select the bookmark in the first file - it should open with no complaints about permissions (which leads to a weak workaround: open all the PDFs you intend to work with!).

I'm having an identical problem. Double and triple checked all permissions on my home directory and reset all of them. It's definitely not a straightforward permissions problems. Any ideas out there?

I'm having the same problem with selected jpg files. I can view them in iPhoto, but even if I export them from iPhoto, preview won't open them (permissions they way). Just want to be sure I'm in on the thread in case anyone solves the problem. Steve

I am experiencing the same issue. Preview says I dont't have permission etc. not only to view pdfs but also to view jpg. Annoying, because it tells me to "get info" but I already have permission

I am also recently having the same problem with random .jpg and .png files when trying to open with Preview. Can open just fine in other apps like Photoshop or in Safari. Is definitely a Preview issue. Checked Get Info and I do have permission (I'm the admin and sole user anyway).

Am in the middle of a new 458GB Time Machine backup (4 hours to go) and not about to reboot. And don't think that will help anyway. Anyone find any solutions?

Know it has been awhile, but I ended up here b/c I had the same problem...hope this helps/works in the future.

If you click on the title/name of the PDF while viewing in "Preview," a drop-down bow will appear giving the option to unlock. Stumbled upon this feature by accident. I had taken a couple of photos and emailed them to myself, only for them to be locked.

Still haven't discovered a master swith to change the defualt, but this is a short-term workaround.

Thanks for trying to help but this is a different issue - see my post for details. I'm pretty sure sandboxing is the cause: you can only access files via bookmarks etc if you have already explicitly opened them.

From: http://developer.apple.com/library/mac/#documentation/Security/Conceptual/AppSan dboxDesignGuide/AppSandboxInDepth/AppSandboxInDepth.html

"Your sandboxed app can access file system locations outside of its container in the following three ways:

• At the specific direction of the user
• By using entitlements for specific file-system locations (described in “Entitlements and System Resource Access”)
• When the file system location is in certain directories that are world readable"