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Step Forward & Step Backward Not Working?


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ivbaseball06

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Hi all,

I recently installed CS6 and have been using it a bunch. For whatever reason my 'Step Backward' and 'Step Forward' are ALWAYS greyed out. I can't use them at all. The only thing that I've been able to do is Undo, which only goes back 1 step. If it makes any difference, I'm on the latest version of Mac OS X. Please help!
 
IDK why they are greyed out unless you have already saved. I think that removes the possibility since step backwards, if I am right since I never use it, will take you back to your last save. You can save stages in your document as you go, then you can always return to one of those. The other thing is that cmd/ctl + z will as you said take you back one step. If you hold the ctl and the alt/opt key + z you can keep going back. The best way to go back multiple steps, IMO, is to use the history palette. I always keep it open under layers. I think the default is set to 20 steps which if you are making clone or paint strokes may take you almost nowhere. However, if you go into preferences you can set the number of history steps, up to 1,000 I believe. That should make your head spin! Go to preferences>performance>history states and up the slider all you want. I believe that the more history states you set, the more RAM you use, so just be careful with that. If your docs get to big, you could give yourself a headache. That is why I save way more frequently than I think necessary. Sometimes I forget and I hold my breath when I go to save . . .


Hope that helps.
 
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My history palette only takes snapshots. It used to be that the history palette documented every single thing I did. For example, I used to be able to do this:

1. Make a dot with a brush.
2. Make a line with a brush.
3. Click 'step backward' and it would go back to in between steps 1 and 2.

In CS6, it doesn't put each step in the history palette automatically. I would have to click 'create new snapshot' every single time to make a checkpoint. Then, clicking 'step backward' or 'step forward' (the same as the keyboard shortcuts you stated) takes me in between my snapshots (checkpoints).

Anyone have any idea how I can make it back to what it was in previous versions? I want to be able to correct a mistake I made more than 1 move before without having to undo everything I've done since the last snapshot.
 
I figured it out. Here's what I did for those that might have the same problem in the future.

Apparently my # of allowed states was set to 1. Because of this every time I did a new action the old ones were deleted because it was only allowing 1 state of history to be saved. This is what ibclare (above) mentioned about changing in preferences up to 1000. Here's where it is on a Mac:

Photoshop -> Preferences -> Performance -> History & Cache -> States

Thanks for your help ibclare!
 
You're welcome. I haven't used a ma in a couple years and I knew it was located differently. On a PC it is Edit>preferences. Good, I'm glad you have it working. 1 step is like no step!
 
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