I have been using Scrivener since version 1, and up until September I was using version 2, as I was using a mac with El Capitan, then I was forced to update to version 3 when I upgraded my computer to a new MacBook Pro with MacOS 12.5 and could no longer use the old version. It has been, not to put too fine a point in it, a nightmare. Scrivener keeps crashing on me on a daily basis. I suspect the problem is an incompatibility with Firefox, which is my default browser (it usually crashes after I look something up online, so that is the most likely culprit). No, I havenât lost any information (yet), but it is incredibly frustrating, and seeing how no new version of Scrivener was released after Ventura came out, I seriously doubt this thing will be less buggy in that one. I really wish I could go back to version 2, that one was incredibly stable, but of course I am stuck.
No, I am not optimistic that this problem will be addressed, but I wanted to let you know that it is out there
This version is old. You may be well served to upgrade to the current version which by recollection is 13.2.
Seeing how no new version of Scrivener was released when Ventura came out (the last update dates back to October 2021), I fear it will be even buggier in that one, which is one of the reasons I am so reluctant to update in the first place. If a version of Scrivener had been released I would obviously have tried that first, hoping that the problem would have been resolved
What version of Scrivener do you have?
What does the crash report say?
Do you see the issue with all projects, or just this one?
Why do you believe this to be a Firefox compatibility issue? Does it primarily happen when youâre adding web pages to the research folder, or opening them from the research folder?
There are no known consistent crashes with the latest version of Scrivener (3.2.3), under either Ventura or previous versions of Mac OS. So weâll need a bit more information to find out what conditions are causing the crash youâre seeing.
Generally speaking, if you are seeing daily crashes, something is wrong, but we canât help you fix it if we donât know itâs happening.
Scrivener is 3.2.3, which is the one that was available in September of last year. The problem is not restricted to one project, and usually manifests itself when I try to go back to scrivener after surfing using Firefox for a while, and I get a spinning beach ball (if it helps, it happens mostly when I am using text to speech to make sure I havenât typed something like âShakespeareâs pubicâ when I meant âShakespeareâs publicâ⊠made that mistake once and I am never trusting the spell checker again, but anyway it may be a three factor conflict. It has never happened without Firefox, I am sure about that, I am not sure if it has ever happened without text to speech). I havenât encountered this bug when using other apps. The app just freezes and I have to force quit, and the file is then rebuilt when I restart. I have no idea where the crash reporter is, or how it works
A spinning beach ball is different from a crash, so I wouldnât expect there to be a report.
How big is the project? This sounds like the sort of thing that might happen if youâre low on system resources, for example, and text-to-speech would be more demanding than just typing.
You might also check and see if you see the issue with other browsers. For instance, Scrivener itself might be fine, but Firefox is failing to release resources that Scrivener needs.
If it stops working I count that as a crash (especially if I canât quit the app because it stops responding and I am told I have to force quit). I donât think Iâm low on system resources (open apps: Scrivener, Firefox, and sometimes TextEdit plus the Finder with 16 GB of memory. The project I am currently working on is 25 MB). I donât know who is to blame, Scrivener or Firefox, but I hate Chrome, I am not too keen on Safari. As I said, I donât expect this bug to ever get resolved, I just wanted to let you know that it is out there⊠and that I really miss the stability of version 2 (never had a problem with that one, even when using a truckload more apps in the background. What has changed is Scrivener).
For what itâs worth, you mentioned earlier that youâre on macOS Monterey version 12.5.
Apple released a patch for macOS Monterey that takes it to 12.6.3. Anytime I start having crashing issues on my Mac, my first stop is checking my macOS and confirming Iâve installed Appleâs latest patches and security updates.
That could help rule out the macOS as a possible factor in this.
You havenât clearly stated if you have tried doing the same tasks with Safari and it doesnât happen.
If that is the case, and it only happens with Firefox then you have your culprit.
From what you have said, it seems the issue is not with Scrivener, but Firefox/Text to speech.
It wouldnât hurt to turn on internal alerts, in the Scrivener â Preferences â General â Warnings tab, and open a support ticket with any information you find.
Please open a support ticket, here:
fwiw, Iâm running Monterey 12.6.3, I use Scrivener 3.2.3 pretty much every day, all day, with multiple projects (in tabs), and I run Firefox for the duration also â as well as a half a dozen other apps. I canât remember the last time Scrivener crashed â and my writing machine âonlyâ has 8Gb.
Iâll leave the diagnostics to the pros.
P.S. I agree that macOS 12.5 should be updated to 12.6.3, but not necessarily to Ventura. Monterey will be supported for a few years yet, so is in no way âoldâ, just not the bleeding edge. Hell, my ancient iPad is âstuckâ on iOS12, but it got a update recently, four gens behind, but still rockinâ.
I donât know whoâs to blame, all I know is who keeps crashing. As for trying Safari, I donât particularly like that one and it is not as if Scrivener crashes immediately as soon as I switch to Firefox. It crashes on average once a day, so I would have to disrupt my entire workflow for maybe a couple of days to check whether or not Safari is flaming out as well, and that is just not worth it. Yes, the constant crashes are a pain, but I am not going to spend countless hours chasing a bug I canât fix (and that probably wonât be fixed even if I somehow manage to track it down because it is a byproduct of a specific combination of apps).
As for updating, I live in a rural area with a really bad internet connections, so downloading an update that is several GB is something I donât do unless I am sure is worth it as it effectively freezes my internet connection for hours (I usually wait until I go visit someone with a reasonable connection⊠welcome to the real world)
It may be a slight pain to adjust a little and use Safari for a day or two, but if that fixed the issue⊠Just saying.
If it didnât fix it, it points to a wider issue rather than a single incompatibility.
Almost any troubleshooting will involve âdisrupting your workflowâ while you check things out.
Further on the concept of diagnostic and troubleshooting steps being disruptiveâfor consistent hanging (or crashing) itâs almost always necessary to disrupt things for a bit, because Scrivener itself is rock solid stable in an expected configuration outside of a few known rarer issues that do not match what you describe. The implication is that the context needs to be tested more than Scrivener, and that can mean shutting off all of your normal programs for a while, gradually bringing them back, booting into safe mode, and other tests. None of that is meant to imply you should forevermore work in safe mode for example (yikes), but itâs how we figure out what is actually messed up, so that the source of the problem can be surgically removed (or updated, as the case may be) and you can otherwise go back to doing everything as you normally do.
The advice in this post is a good checklist of things to look for when running into issues. This will be particularly true if you used Appleâs âuser folder migrationâ utility to carry over everything to the new Mac. That can bring old problems over, and old plug-ins and such that no longer work and are now just causing other programs to crash.