Create PDF Fails
Overview
Colleague fails to successfully produce PDFs when created from the Report Browser.Details
There are a few different ways in which the Create PDF button in the Colleague report browser can fail to successfully produce and display the PDF:
- Clicking Create PDF causes Colleague to completely lock up, either before or during the display of the message "Creating PDF, please wait..."
- Clicking Create PDF always fails to bring up the PDF after the button is clicked, either producing an error message or simply doing nothing, but otherwise Colleague may continue to be used as normal.
- Clicking Create PDF sometimes fails to bring up the PDF after the button is clicked, but sometimes works. When it does not work an error message is not displayed; Colleague just appears to do nothing after the "Creating PDF, please wait..." message disappears.
Resolution
The best resolution to try depends on which situation is occurring:
Case 1: Colleague Locks Up
Customers who have the AOL toolbar installed in Internet Explorer and who use Adobe Reader 9 may experience an issue where iexplore.exe instances for PDF file exports from UI 4 persist even after the browser window is closed. When customers run multiple PDF exports, they acquire more and more iexplore.exe processes that stay open, eventually causing Colleague to hang when they click Create PDF.
To resolve the issue, the AOL toolbar should be uninstalled, or the customer should upgrade to a more recent version of Adobe Reader.
Case 2: Create PDF Always Fails
When the Create PDF button always fails to successfully produce a PDF, the problem is usually either with the customer's Internet Options security settings in Windows, or with the customer's Adobe Reader plugin for the browser they are using to access Colleague.
To address problems with security settings in Internet Options, follow the resolution described on this page.
To address problems with the Adobe Reader browser plugin, try uninstalling and reinstalling the plugin. If the customer is not using the most recent version of Adobe Reader available to IWU employees, the issue may also be resolved by an upgrade.
Case 3: Create PDF Sometimes Fails
When customers experience the Create PDF button only failing sometimes (on the same computer), usually it is because they still have a previously-created PDF still open in a browser window. Customers must ALWAYS close an Internet Explorer or other browser window containing a previously-created PDF before creating another one. If they do not, then the old report will remain open and the new one will never appear.
If new PDFs still fail to appear after all previously-created ones are closed, check the currently running processes to verify that there aren't any bad instances of the executable for the browser being used still open in the background.