MacOS – Photoshop on mac “could not save [file] because write access was not granted”

adobe-photoshopmacospermission

I've been seeing this error a lot lately:

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Could not save [file] because write access was not granted

I've checked all the standard reasons why permission to save a file might be denied:

  • The file is not open in any other application
  • The user does have access to the drive and directory
  • No other users on a network are accessing the file
  • The file is not read-only
  • No other save operations are happening
  • The connection to the drive is fine

I've seen this happen on Lion and Mavericks. I've only ever seen it on a Mac, and only ever with Photoshop, with .PSD files.

Best Answer

After some trial and error, I tracked it down to the file being selected in Finder.

It seems like when Finder is displaying a preview of a PSD, it locks the file.

It seems to only happen in this view mode:

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Selecting another file in Finder, or switching view mode, or closing the finder window, all prevent this error.

So while Finder is like this, the file won't save:

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Clicking off it frees it for saving:

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As does switching to this view mode to one that doesn't show a preview:

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