PageMaker failing to load on OS X

Hello,

I have a rather interesting situation. I run a lab of eMacs running OS 10.2.6. On three of these machines, PageMaker now refuses to open under certain user accounts.

In the Admin and root account, PageMaker can open just fine. However, under the other user accounts ("Real Change" and , Classic opens and loads, and PageMaker begins to go through the starting process. It loads several different aspects (for lack of the correct term), but when it tries to "initialize the clipboard", it abruptly shuts down. I checked and Classic is still running. I've opened other apps that use the clipboard (PhotoShop 6.0) under the "Real Change account" and it works fine.

So, since it works under the admin accounts but not the other user accounts, I figured it was a permissions problem. However, I've chmoded the clipboard with no change. I also checked the owner and group settings, and they looked correct. The only thing out of order that I noticed is the size of the clipboard, which is 0. Perplexing, no?

Thoughts, comments, snide remarks?

Thanks,
Sal

Nevermind

I just renamed the PageMaker preference file in the System Folder and it seems to be working just fine on all accounts. Strange though. Wish I knew why.

Re: Nevermind

Preference files can become corrupt and cause weird errors or the program can refuse to launch (like your situation.) Trashing (or renaming) the preference file is a good first step with these sort of files. Just make sure you have your serial number handy (if there is one) before you trash a preference file because some programs store your number there.

So I was able to trash the preferences for PageMaker on most of the machines. I then launched PageMaker again and the program DID NOT create a new Preference file. But, for some reason, on two of the machines, I trashed the preference file and launched the program. But PageMaker recreated the preference file and the app crashed again. I tried changing permissions to no avail.

Help?

I sure wish PageMaker would become carbon

Not going to happen since PageMaker is a dead app.

Isn't InDesign the equivalent to Pagemaker in OSX?

-g