Fail to start - Message: ASP will run in one instance only

[Firlefanzus]

Dear ASP-Friends,

I'm new here.
Our agency worked with Lightroom in the past, but we are definitely fed up with running around with an external disk so we decided to switch to ASP

For this reason I installed ASP on our workstation and I was glad of being able working with network drives on our server.

Now the problem:
After starting ASP under different user accounts on one and the same machine we receive the message, ASP will run in one instance only.
So at the moment it's not possible to start ASP anywhere on this machine.
Is there a multi-user-licence required?
If it is so - we couldn't find any on the Corel website.

Thank you very much for your efforts!

Kind regards

[afx]

AS is a single user application.

There are two issues that need to be solved:

Multiple instances of AS: Do you really want to run on one box only? Or was this just for testing?

Parallel access from multiple systems/users: As long as you work in FS mode and do not work on the same images, this is rivial.
Unfortunately the Catalogs are not meant for multiuser operation, so one catalog would be locked (not sure if AS enforces this) by a user while working on it.

cheers
afx

[teknisyan]

Dear ASP-Friends,

I'm new here.
Our agency worked with Lightroom in the past, but we are definitely fed up with running around with an external disk so we decided to switch to ASP

For this reason I installed ASP on our workstation and I was glad of being able working with network drives on our server.

Now the problem:
After starting ASP under different user accounts on one and the same machine we receive the message, ASP will run in one instance only.
So at the moment it's not possible to start ASP anywhere on this machine.
Is there a multi-user-licence required?
If it is so - we couldn't find any on the Corel website.

Thank you very much for your efforts!

Kind regards

If your setup is just installing it on a local machine and that machine has mutiple users, then you may want to check if the previous user logs-out of his/her username, this will make sure that any application that was used by that user was terminated properly.

But if your setup is via network, then we need to wait until I get a response, since I escalated your question to the proper channel.

[Firlefanzus]

Thank you very much for your replies.

It is not the problem of a locked catalog while another user is working with it.

The machine on which I installed ASP is for testing and has the following OS: Windows 7 Enterprise x64 english.
The machine is a member of our domain.
The catalogs and settings of ASP are stored on the file server (shared).

All previous users were logged off after starting ASP on the test machine.
After a reboot, login myself and trying to start ASP, the message "only one instance of ASP is possible" turns up and abborts the start of ASP.

The thing is we're working with folder redirection on Windows Server 2008 R2 for our profiles so it doesen't matter on which machine we're logging on, our desktop etc. is everywhere the same.
I supposed it has something to do with this and maybe there is an existing entry somewhere of each user who has been logged on to this machine and started ASP once.
I guessed that makes ASP believe that it is still opened by another user.

But neither in the directory .\users\%username%\AppData\Local nor LocalLow nor Roaming I was able to find a folder named "Corel\AfterShotPro\" or similar.
But very well in the registry of the Windows 7 Workstation: Under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Corel\AfterShot Pro\ there are different folders with many entries.
Some of them are named "LastRun" and "license".
Maybe ASP is checking this tree for every user and is blocking the start based on particular entries which were not
deleted or reset after the logging off of a previous user.

What I will try to do this evening, is:
First I delete all user profiles on this machine as an administrator and reboot it.
Second I will log me on with my normal user account and start ASP. Thereby all entries in the registry related to ASP will be created new by the system.
So there will not exist any other registry entries relating to ASP on the machine than mine.
I think and hope that under these circumstances ASP should be able to start again.

But that wouldn't solve the problem.
The next time another user logs on this machine will let occur the same problem again.

I will report the facts of my test.

Kind regards

[Firlefanzus]

Hello again,

with a new user account I was able to start and work with ASP.
After closing ASP and logging off, I logged on as a different user, and - here we are - exactly the same problem.
I think this is a case for the ASP-Developers.

Until this problem is solved, we have to go on with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom, sadly.

I'd be glad to receive an eMail, when somebody worked on - and hopefully solved - this problem.

Kind regards

[BitKeeper]

Hi,

Can you start AfterShot Pro and go to File->Preferences and show us the two paths "User Folder Location" and "Default Catalog Location"?

Are you trying to only have one generic User Folder settings on the server?

Thanks,
BK

[Firlefanzus]

Hi BK,

maybe that's the solution.
We wanted to have the same ASP-Settings for each user.
So we defined only one generic settings folder on the server.
Logging off and logging on with a different user, ASP isn't able to release the session/instance of the previous user because of pointing to the one and only settings folder, I guess.

But - after shutting down the machine (client), starting the client again and logging on with the credentials of this different user, ASP is going to work as it should.
Shutting down a machine only for letting a different user doing his job is little bit nasty.

Your hint delivered the idea to define an "AfterShotPro_Settings"-Folder for each user who possibly works on this client.
In our environment the path within each user is as follows: K:\AppData\Roaming\Corel\AfterShotPro_Settings (K:\ means the redirected C:\users\%username%\-Directory).
After testing again - there is no difference at all: Still the same message "ASP will run in one instance only".
Frustrating.

Could you please tell me the default path to the ASP Settings-Folder (right after a clean installation of ASP)?
Maybe my paths are not correct.
I couldn't find it in the manual.

Kind regards

[wds937]

Could you please tell me the default path to the ASP Settings-Folder (right after a clean installation of ASP)?
Maybe my paths are not correct.
I couldn't find it in the manual.

My folder is at C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\Corel\AfterShot Pro .

I presume this would be the default setting, as I don't remember specifying any folder names on installation, and I didn't change any folder preferences afterward.

[BitKeeper]

Hi,

Default settings are:
C:/Users/user/AppData/Local/Corel/AfterShot Pro
and
C:/Users/user/Pictures/AfterShot Pro Catalogs

I think that sharing your catalog and user settings is a bad idea.

Maybe the answer could be something like leaving the default catalog on the local machine and creating one catalog for each project your team works on on your server(slower then local catalog). Then open and close each catalog for a project as you are working on it. With only one person working on one project/catalog at one time.

I am a ubuntu linux user and have set up syncing of some of the settings folder with Ubuntu One. You could do something with dropbox or by scripts (dfs, gpo's) on your windows machines to do the same.

Currently am syncing the folders between my desktop and laptop.
<usersettings>/AfterShotPro/CopySets
<usersettings>/AfterShotPro/Plugins
<usersettings>/AfterShotPro//Presets
<usersettings>/AfterShotPro/batches
<usersettings>/AfterShotPro/defaults

I tested the windows install on my work pc running windows7 connected to a domain. With Aftershot''s default catalog and user settings I was able to run Aftershot under my login. Switched users to another AD account with ASP still running in my session, and was able to run another instance of ASP under the new account.

Hope some of this helps.

Thanks,
BK

[Firlefanzus]

Thank you very much for your answers.

So I will try it again with the default path for the ASP settings in the %username%\AppData\Local\ directory.
Maybe "Local" is the magic word!
Tomorrow I'll test and report again.

The catalog is shared on the server and doesn't cause any problem.

Kind regards.

[Firlefanzus]

During the weekend I tried the following:

1. Uninstalled ASP, deleted all paths, cleaned the registry.
2. After a reboot I installed ASP new with the default paths for the ASP settings and catalog.
3. I didn't change any settings. I was logged on as an administrator. ASP started without any problem.
4. Put in the serial number and ran through the registration procedure.
5. Restarted the machine and logged on as User1 (no administrator).
6. I started ASP, the window where I was asked about the paths offered me the administrator's paths (those default locations not altered during the installation <?!>).
7. After clicking on Next, the wellknown message appeared "ASP will run in one instance only". I aborted.
8. My workaround was the following: Right-Click on the ASP desktop icon - Properties - Advanced - Checked 'Run as Administrator' - put in administrator's credentials.
9. I started ASP (still being logged on as User1) - put in administrator's credentials - and: ASP starts without any problem.
10. I altered the paths for the settings and the catalog. ASP worked.
11. This procedure I ran through for each domain user who works on the machine. So it worked (but still within the one and only adminstrator session in the background).
In the productive environment I will create a new user named 'ASPAdmin' with local admin rights and tell the password to my colleagues.
A stuporous measure I admit, but at the moment I can't see any better way.

The result is quite clear: There is no User management implemented in ASP.
So at the moment the only advantage regarded to networking in a team for ASP opposite to Lightroom is, that the ASP catalog can be stored on a network drive where the user has to own at least modify rights to lock the catalog against access from others while he is working with it.

I doubt that this will be enough to beat Lightroom.
In my opinion the ASP developers will have to implement a full user management into ASP very soon.
Otherwise teams stay with Lightroom and ASP will vanish into thin air.

In hope of an implemented user management very soon we keep at ASP. Please don't let us wait too long.
The product is worth to it.

Kind regards

[afx]

While AS is definitely not a multi user app, I think you are making this much harder than it should be.

Your first mistake is to run AS as admin. A recipe for disaster.
Never ever run apps as admin!!

If you run into sharing problems, create a specific, non-privileged group to control access to the apps data.

AS itself has no restrictions on multiple user profiles on the box. You only run into such nonsense because of either the mistake of starting up as admin or maybe because some of the Qt settings are stored in a brain dead way on Windows. But I guess that could easily be fixed by setting the permissions on those registry entries.
On Linux, I can log in as any user and run AS without any restrictions apart from those imposed by regular file permissions.

cheers
afx

[Firlefanzus]

Dear afx,

I know it's nonsense. But I can't get ASP started as a normal user.
The wellknown message appears.
I'd be glad about detailed information by the developers.
I cleaned the registry and deleted all paths.
What else can I do?

We can't wait too long because renewing all of the keywords is a lot of work.
The workaround is functioning. So we can go on without Lightroom.
This is our intention.

Kind regards

[afx]

I know it's nonsense. But I can't get ASP started as a normal user.

I assume because you did your first run as Admin.

What happens when you perform your first run as an unprivileged user?

cheers
afx

[Firlefanzus]

Dear afx,

as you can see in the past posts I tried all combinations.
The problem seems to be: The first one wins, all others who try thereafter loose.
ASP is not able to release the session by logging off the user.

I give up now.
It's a bug.
So we're looking forward to the solution.

Thanks a lot for your support!

Kind regards