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Mark Sansone Author

Level 3

545 points

iWeb Crashes on Publish

Hello all,

iWeb crashes when I publish. I can not publish to a folder, publish all, or publish. It seems to crash around the same place, but I can't say it always crashes when it's on the same item.

I've tried to boot into safe mode and publish, but still no luck.

It's relatively small... 60 or so blogs and about 2 dozen photo pages.

I'm travelling so I don't have access to anyone else's machine to try swapping around the domain file.

I'm cranking on an intel Macbook Core Duo 2 GHZ with a gig of ram and plenty of hard drive space.

Thanks in advance

Macbook Core Duo 2.0, Mac OS X (10.4.9), 1 GB RAM, 120GB HD

Posted on Apr 12, 2007 3:59 PM

77 replies

zencat

Level 1

7 points

May 1, 2007 4:24 PM in response to ScottDirect

Me too. Done. 🙂

Mark Sansone Author

Level 3

545 points

May 1, 2007 7:57 PM in response to zencat

So, I finally had the time and called Apple. Since I'm in New Zealand, I was hooked up with Apple's Australia help. Please don't get me wrong, the guy who helped me did his absolute best and was incredibly nice.

After about an hour of fiddling around, it was decided by Apple Tech Support that iWeb still works fine.

What determined the application still works was this: We created a new user, opened iWeb, created a simple website, and published it to a folder with no issues.

When I tried moving my Domain file from the old user to the new one and opening it in the new user's iWeb, it had the same issues as before. I was told that since iWeb CAN still publish, just not with MY domain file, that something is wrong with MY file which is not THEIR problem.

!!!

So, I was left with the parting words that I should copy my domain file and put it somewhere safe. Then try to find a corrupt file somewhere in my blogs/sites by individually deleting each blog/site until it CAN publish, open the copied Domain, delete just that one, and see if it works. Otherwise, maybe I should try a more 'professional' application.

!!!!!

Extremely frustrated.

May 2, 2007 8:04 AM in response to Mark Sansone

Wow, that really is aggravating.

I almost hate to ask--did you try what they suggested? I know your site may be large enough that it's just not practical.

If Apple is really committed to a strategy of ignoring this problem, I'm afraid it's time for all of us to start spreading the word and advising people not to buy or use iWeb.

zencat

Level 1

7 points

May 2, 2007 10:43 AM in response to Mark Sansone

"...maybe I should try a more 'professional' application."

Wow. There's a ringing endorsement from Apple.

iWeb -- makes for a great demo at WWDC, but if you actually want to use it to, you know, build a website, it's better to use a more "professional" application.

zencat

Level 1

7 points

May 2, 2007 11:43 AM in response to Mark Sansone

Okay, so I've actually tried doing what the Apple tech suggested and I've had some curious success and failure.

I do remember the approximate time I started having my troubles and I recall adding a new page (not a blog entry) at that time. So I decided to go for broke and delete that page. I hit Publish…and it published without a problem! Could I be that lucky?

I did a little work on a current blog entry, hit Publish. Crash. (Yep, too good to be true).

I reopened and went into my blogs and started fishing. Again, I knew the approx time and I deleted one image intensive entry (of course, it was one of my best "scoops"). Hit Publish...and it went like butter!

Okay. That one blog entry must be the problem, right? So I pull out the saved domain file, opened it, deleted just that blog entry (keeping now the page I deleted before) and hit Publish. Crash.

Luckily, I had saved the domain file I had experimented on, so I pulled that out, opened it, hit Publish and it worked. But, clearly, once is not enough. I did a little whatnot in a new blog entry, hit Publish...and it worked again!

Weird that only the combination of a deleted blog entry and a page seemed to turn the trick.

I could and should continue to experiment, but I've closed iWeb because I want to live in a world were my iWeb actually works..if only for a few precious hours.

Mark Sansone Author

Level 3

545 points

May 6, 2007 10:06 PM in response to zencat

Hours, and hours of work lead me to this:

I can delete some/most of the sites to make this guy work again. Really, it's the blogs I have to delete.

Seems to be no magic number of blogs that cause it to fail. It appears to be too much media that causes it to crash. Too many pictures. Compressing the images beforehand HELPS, but there still seems to be (for lack of a better word) a Limit on how much you shove in there.

Let me make this clear: There is no one specific blog/image/file that causes iWeb to crash.

I guess using a utility to split up the website would help, however the way my website is organized wouldn't really lend itself to being 'split'. I've got two things. A blog, and a pictures page linking to all my pictures pages.

Mac OS X (10.4.9)

zencat

Level 1

7 points

May 7, 2007 9:26 AM in response to Mark Sansone

I've discovered much the same thing, Mark. There is no one corrupted blog/page/file that causes it to crash. After thinking I've found one, I'm right back to crashing on publish. The problem is iWeb, plain and simple, and Apple needs to fix it with an upgrade.

May 7, 2007 11:27 AM in response to Mark Sansone

My experience supports this conclusion too. Thanks for keeping us informed; let's keep in touch if anyone has any tips or breakthroughs.

Mark Sansone Author

Level 3

545 points

May 7, 2007 2:36 PM in response to zencat

While I hate to be a cynic, it seems to be in my nature....

From what I gather, Apple will probably not be too keen on releasing a fix (which would probably take a bit of work, as the problem seems [at least to me] inherent on how iWeb manages it's content) since iWeb 2 will likely be a major re-write to incorporate the newest graphics-handling technologies in Leopard.

I can only suggest that we keep hounding them; report a crash a day, send them feedback daily, and try to at least call apple support once.

They need to know this is a pressing issue, one which can not wait until the next big release. October.

In the meantime, as ScottDirect suggests, keep in touch and keep experimenting and see if we can figure out a fix.

-Mark

pgatto

Level 1

0 points

May 7, 2007 8:45 PM in response to ScottDirect

Well I guess I'm one more victim!

Mark Sansone Author

Level 3

545 points

May 8, 2007 9:08 PM in response to pgatto

Pgatto,

Sorry to hear. It's ridiculous, really.

Have you tried bringing your machine in to an Apple Store Genius Bar or called into the Apple tech support?

I'm curious to know what other people are being told by Apple.

In the meantime please use Apple's iWeb feedback to let them know there is a problem, and continue to report the crashes.

-Mark

zencat

Level 1

7 points

May 9, 2007 12:34 PM in response to Mark Sansone

It's become so bad for me, I closed my eyes and just zapped a HUGE number of my blog entries. I'm a news site (for literary James Bond news), not a personal blog, so I could delete old news and it wasn't too painful.

It's now publishing fast and fine.

Sigh. This is such a shame. I really want my site to be news archive as well as a headline site. But because I hitched my wagon to iWeb, I can't have both. But maybe if an update fixes this issue I can go back and rebuild all my old news stories (I've saved an old domain file with them).

BTW, I have called AppleCare (or maybe it was .Mac Help) about this. But because I've split my two sites into two domain files (and I foolishly told them this), they will not help me as "they do not support custom configurations." Gave them a nice excuse to hang up and not deal with this.

May 9, 2007 6:43 PM in response to Mark Sansone

Hey Gang,

My sister in law is having the same problem. Gets an unknown error message when trying to publish. Now, if she wanted to move her iweb created website to her ibook, what files would need to be copied over and where would they be located?

grudy

Level 1

14 points

May 9, 2007 7:49 PM in response to Mark Sansone

I too am having publishing problems.
iWeb hangs at the 75% upload level and it later crashes or I have to force quit.

iBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

iBook G4 Mac OS X (10.4.8)

May 10, 2007 4:27 AM in response to grudy

Hi All
for what its worth last year I had the same or similar combination of problems, with photo heavy pages.
I tried all the copying files and making new sites and deleting corrupted pages or parts of pages...loading in differrent orders..
finally went to genius bar (Charlotte NC)after painfully slow apple support blamed internet connection
does all this seem familiar?
guy at genius bar interviewed me for 10 secs, opened the back of the laptop and took out my (admittedly cheapo) aftermarket ram substituted Apple ram and
'Hey presto 'no further problems.
He said that any good quality RAM is OK.
It may not solve eveything but its worth a try.
Also RAM errors may not be application specific it just cannot work around it in this program so it may be the only place it shows up.
I'm not a techie so thats my 2 cents worth.
hope its some use.
M

iWeb Crashes on Publish