Storyline 360 crashes when try to copy/paste

Sep 29, 2017

Every time I ctrl+d or copy and paste, Storyline 360 crashes. I've uninstalled/resinstalled to no effect.

Any ideas? Or does Storyline just not support this?

Thanks, Steve.

73 Replies
David Reynolds

Thank you for your reply.

It happens with either images or text, or both combined. I've tried switching to copying and pasting but the same issue arises. I'm using the latest version of Storyline 360 but like I mentioned, this has been happening off and on for a year.

Sometimes the issue won't happen for a few days and by then you're so used to your motor functions while working that when it does happen you can go a bit mad, haha.

Katie Riggio

Thanks for those extra details, David. I'd go mad myself!

Because of the random nature of this issue, this is an excellent opportunity for our Support team to jump in so we can investigate further! I opened a case with them where you'll be getting an email from one of our engineers with some next steps. 

I'll follow along to update this discussion with what we find out!

Lauren Connelly

Hi Kate!

I don't have an update to report, but I'd like to investigate what you're experiencing on your end!

First, are you noticing Storyline 360 crashing when cut and pasting every photo or just specific ones?

Secondly, is this happening in one project or multiple? 

This type of scenario occurs if there is a corrupted element in the file. I'm happy to test your file to see where the snag is. You can share your file with me by using this link!

Katie Riggio

Great news, everyone!

We fixed the issue where Storyline 360 would randomly freeze or crash when using the CRTL+D key to duplicate a text box. Here's how to update Storyline 360 to see all the recent enhancements and fixes.

If the problem reappears, please record a Peek 360 screencast for me and I'll be happy to help!

Vincent Scoma

Hi Mateusz,

Thank you for letting us know!

What happens if you copy text between Word and Notepad? Does copying/pasting the text between those applications work as intended? Since it sounds like the crash is only happening in Storyline, what may help is to try a simple repair of Storyline

If you continue to experience a snag after running the repair, please let us know! 

Mateusz Szuter

It works copying between Word and Notepad. I've found the culprit, however I had to use some website that shows ALL the chars in text (https://www.soscisurvey.de/tools/view-chars.php).

As I'm using latin extended fonts, I have ą letter in my alphabet. Tracking changes in word left only 'tail' of the ą, which didn't display, neither in Word, Storyline or Notepad. 

If someone is experiencing that kind of bug I suggest to use the site above. Wouldn't blame SL team for that much - that's not expected behavior of any text editing app.

Debra Gilreath

Hello, everyone, 

I am also experiencing the issue with SL360 crashing when I attempt to copy/paste from MS Word.  This issue began after I ran the latest update. From the posts above, it appears that this has been a known and reported issue for quite some time. 

Can someone please share any resolution to the issue?

Katie Riggio

Hi Debra,

I'm happy to look into the crash with you. A few questions to help us unlock a fix:

  • What version of Word are you using?
  • What happens if you copy text between Word and Notepad?

Also, our Support team can troubleshoot in real-time while you copy and paste text from Word into Storyline 360. Let us know if you can do a screen share with us: 

Katie Riggio

Hi Zuzana,

So sorry for the trouble there! You're right: constant crashing should not be happening.

Referencing Debra's case, here's what we uncovered:

The issue roots in a previous bug where Storyline would crash when the clipboard has content, which happens when you copy content from an external source like Word. Based on our discussion you confirmed that you usually use Word in copying content and paste it over to Storyline. You are also still using the old trigger workflow.

With that, we've concluded that the issue indeed roots in using the old trigger workflow when copying content from Word. Since you installed the latest update of Storyline 360, the crashing should stop.

Let me know if you see the crash on the latest update of Storyline 360, Update 43. You can also work directly with us through this link.

Joyce Maurin

Oh no! It happened again!

Here is a particular use case: I was able to copy-paste from Powerpoint but now I'm trying to copy-paste from a textbox in SL360 to another textbox in the same layer and SL360 is crashing.

I've done the update and it still occured. I've imported the .story into a new one and it still occured.

My "workaround" has been to copy-paste the text the other way (the "paste" area became the "copy" area) and it worked. Is it possible that the problem was the "complexity" of the text I tried to copy-paste? I have different sizes, bullet points, text-alignment and bold text.

Katie Riggio

Hi Joyce,

So sorry to hear about the crash. I'm happy to jump in!

I used Storyline 360 Update 43, where I'm having difficulty recreating the crash during copy/paste. Here's a quick video of my experience.

Would you mind sharing your file with me? I'd like to try to replicate the crash with your textbox and let you know how it goes! You can send the Storyline file to me privately through this link.

Mateusz Szuter

Hello Katie (and maybe everyone concerned),

Just a moment ago I've had the issue once again - my SL360 crashed, when I tried to copy 'broken' text. (in my case ć́ się̨ - as tou can see, there's something odd in ć and ę :)).

Two good things happened however - I've found that these symbols show only when copying text from PDF to word, and then from word to SL360.

Second good thing - I've installed some update I didn't see earlier (43) and now SL360 doesn't freeze :) The letters looks bad, but at least no sudden freeze :) Good job!

Mateusz Szuter

Leslie, as I described in my first paragraph :) What I've meant that now my SL doesn't freeze, just instead of having ć I have ć́ or some similiar 'bad letter' instead of proper one (I don't even know if you can see the difference tbh), but that's not the SL fault and also that's 10000% better than sudden freeze :)

Alain Stroud

Good day,

I have been having trouble with StoryLine 360 for a while now. It seems I am not the only one experiencing the issue, but would appreciate your assistance. 

On any project that I work on (or newly created), when I try to copy/paste SL will freeze for 4-5 seconds and then auto-close.

I have noted that it occurs when I try to do the following:

- Paste shapes from powerpoint;
- Paste copies of the same shape on SL;
- Pasting text from word into a SL shape.

Could you please advise what I can do. I have already done a full uninstall of Articulate and reinstalled it, but it is doing exactly the same. Using Reply360 I was able to create a short 1-minute video that shows exactly what it does. 

Your guidance would be appreciated.