Forum Discussion
Storyline 3 stuck - says "Initializing commands..." - all after the Windows 10 "upgrade
I have had a host of problems after the most recent "forced" Windows 10 upgrade. My audio driver for my preamp no longer works and now Storyline 3 freezes. It gets to "Initializing commands...," and then nothing. Anybody have any advice? If firing a pistol through the PC is all you have, I've already thought of that, trust me. After Microsoft threatened this upgrade for weeks (and literally did it when I wasn't looking...), it finally completed the upgrade, completely blew my audio system out of the water and now threatens my us of software as well. I'd love it if anyone has any ideas about this...
37 Replies
Hi there, Scott. Slowly back away from the pistol.... 😉
Can you try something for me? End any Storyline processes you have running, do a reboot, and then right-click your Storyline 3 icon on your desktop.
Go to Properties in the dropdown, and then click on the Compatibility tab in that window. If you are allowed to, check the box to run the program as administrator.
Then try to launch Storyline 3 again. Let me know what happens, and then we'll see about next steps!
Hi Crystal,
Thanks for your levity - and for your solution. That seemed to do the trick. I got Storyline 3 to launch...finally. But while we're on the subject - what's with all of the constant reactivation all the time? Between version 1, 2 & 3, I'll bet I have "activated" each of my products over 20 times. Why wouldn't I activate a product once, and then have it activated for the rest of the time I was using the product on that one machine? It doesn't take that long to complete the process, but I'm just curious why a "non-subscription" product requires constant re-installation and reactivation all of the time.
But again, my thanks for helping solve the "sticking" issue - that seemed to work well. Now if you get Storyline to run two times in a row without having to activate again, then you'll be a true miracle worker!
Best,
Scott
LOL! Just did a Windows update, and you saved me again.
Hi Crystal, I too had the same problem and your recommendation did solve the problem for me. Is this a temporary fix?
Hi Scott,
Each time Storyline is installed on the machine it'll look for the activation again. It's treating it as a brand new installation - and with Windows updating, that would trigger it too.
Now if Windows hasn't update and you haven't reinstalled Storyline, that's something we'd want to take a deeper look at! Our Support Engineers can help pull some system info and see what may be happening.
After going through the latest Windows update yesterday and activating Storyline, if you shut down your computer and try to open it again - are you prompted to activate Storyline?
Hi Ashley,
I don't typically reinstall Storyline - ever. Windows updates? That's anybody's guess. I confess that I leave "automatic updates" on for convenience, but I'm really rethinking that strategy now. As I said, I'm tired of spending 45 minutes every time there's a minor update and my entire sound system gets blown out. For some reason, Microsoft apparently has never heard of the SoundBlaster cards, because every time they update Windows 10, I reinstall drivers for nearly an hour. And it's for very minor updates - but I digress.
I don't really keep track of what's happening behind the scenes - who has time for all of that? But I know that I have virtually never purposefully reinstalled any of the software - version 1, 2, or 3 - and I have had to reactivate each version multiple times. I don't even know how many, but I'd say conservatively more than five. Which seems excessive - but when you say that Storyline reactivates every time Windows updates, well then that makes sense. It's not particularly comforting, but at least I understand why it's happening. I know it only takes an extra minute, but I just didn't understand why it was happening. Now I do.
Thanks for the explanation.
Scott
Hi Scott,
I know how painful Windows updates can be and in an odd sense of irony just saw the pop up from Microsoft asking if I'd like to recommend Windows 10 to my friends. Nope, if only as I thought I'd disabled all those pop ups. 🙂
If you see the activation message again, and Windows hasn't told you that they've done any updates please let me know and I can help you get started working with our Support Engineers. They are well equipped to dig into anything else that may be a play here and if it's something determined to be a bug on our end, we'll be able to connect with the rest of our team to find a fix.
I hope you enjoyed a nice weekend, and if there is anything else I can help with, please let me know!
I am having the exact same problem. I know I need to reactivate Storyline - but I don't know how.
Sorry you're getting stuck, Jill! Did you have a chance to try the steps Crystal recommended above?
If you see a window that is asking for your serial number and it's not already populated there, copy and paste the number from your purchase confirmation email. If you need help, let us know!
Awesome, Neal. I'm glad that worked. Always a good step to install as administrator to get around any issues like that.
Same thing happening here with the Windows upgrade. Sadly, I do not have administrator access on my PC. Am I going to have to have my IT director come to my office every time I need to run Storyline 3? (Which is daily...)
Hi Keith,
You may only need to install as the admin - but after a Windows update, you'll likely need to install it again. Once it's installed using admin priviledges you can continue as normal and activate with your serial number.
I have the same problem in my articulate.
I need your support... because my articulate it was normal before Windows 10 Update in this week. I think thats the problem need a Articulate update to resolve this. I already tried everything with microsoft technical support, my company technical support, everything... I had already sent an email support for the Articulate.
