When you contact us we may need to ask for additional information such as log files, screenshots, or screen recordings to help us find the best solution. This article contains instructions on collecting the information we might need.
On this page
Note: Information shared with us is 100% confidential, and we’ll delete any files you share as soon as we’ve finished our investigations.
If you’re troubleshooting an issue that’s difficult to describe or reproduce, you may find it useful to give our Support Team temporary access to your Workspace. Support access expires after seven days automatically, but you can disable it earlier.
How to take screenshots on your Mac
You can quickly and easily take a screenshot by pressing ⌘⇧5 (CMD+Shift+5). This will reveal a frame highlighting the current screenshot area, which you can resize as needed. There are also options that allow you to capture your entire screen, a specific window etc.
Once you have selected the area you want, click on the Capture option; your screenshot will display in the bottom right corner for a few seconds. It will save to your Desktop, where you can open and edit it if necessary. You can find more detailed instructions on Apple’s website.
How to create a screen recording
Open your QuickTime Player app and choose File > New Screen Recording from the menu to create a simple recording. Click on Options and then click Show Mouse Clicks, as this helps us diagnose the issue. Click the Record option, and the recording will begin. Once you have captured what you need, click on the stop icon on the top right side of the menu bar.
After you select stop , the recording will save to your Desktop, and it will open in a new window for you to view.
Additionally, you can also enable recording via your Mac’s microphone if you are comfortable doing so. Use the same options menu and talk through your issue as you make your screen recording.
How to send a crash report
Crash logs are useful to determine what happened to cause the crash. There are two ways to share a crash report with us:
Option 1: Use the crash report window
If the Mac app crashes, try opening it again — you’ll see a window titled Problem Report for Sketch. Please enter your email address and, if possible, add a brief comment describing what you were doing before the crash. Including your email helps us locate your report and follow up if needed.
Please let us know if you submitted a crash report via this window, and include the email address you used so we can locate it on our end.
Option 2: Collect the crash report from your Mac
If the Mac app crashes and the crash report window doesn’t appear when you relaunch it, you can get the crash report manually by following these steps:
- In Finder, go to your Applications folder, then Utilities, and launch Console.
- Select Diagnostic Reports on the sidebar and locate the most recent crash.
- Optionally, you can type “sketch” on the search bar of the console to quickly locate the report.
- When found, control-click it, and then select Reveal in Finder from the shortcut menu.
- Copy, or drag and drop the selected file from the Finder window to attach it to your message to us.
How to record a sample process file
If the Mac app becomes slow or unresponsive we recommend recording a sampled log file. The sampling process will gather a report that contains helpful information to debug the problem.
The sampling process log must be captured while the Mac app is slow. You’ll need to trigger the slowness in the document while recording the sample process log.
-
Open the Terminal application from your Applications/Utilities folder and run the following command:
- sample Sketch 120 -wait -mayDie -file ~/Desktop/SketchSample.txt .
-
The “120” parameter sets the duration of the recording in seconds. Adjust it to give yourself enough time to reproduce the slowdown, so the recording captures the issue.
- Open the problematic document immediately and try to reproduce the steps that cause the slowdown.
- Within about 2 minutes, a file called SketchSample.txt will be created on your Desktop. Attach it to your reply and send it over.
How to record Sketch logs
If the problem occurs while working with Workspace files or collaborating in real-time, we’ll ask you to collect a Sketch log.
To successfully collect this log, you need first to reproduce the issue, i.e., slowness, and then collect the log file. Please follow the below steps:
-
Open a Workspace file and reproduce the problem.
- If the problem happens while collaborating with someone else, have at least one colleague connect with you on the same file.
- Open a new Finder window and select Applications > Utilities > Terminal.
-
Open the Terminal and paste the command:
bash <(curl -fsSL https://git.io/sketchlogs) 60m
Note: The 60m parameter needs to be set to the length (in minutes) that is needed to record the issue. This doesn’t mean the log will run for an hour, but rather that it will collect events from the last hour, the capture actually takes just a few moments to complete.
Once the log has been collected, a zip file will be on your desktop, titled: “Sketch Logs (date).zip”. This is the file you’ll share with the Support Team.
How to collect browser details
If you’re experiencing issues with the web app, it is best to know which browser you’re using.
While answering “Safari”, or “Chrome” is correct, that’s only part of the information needed. This handy link will detect the exact details of your browser. Select the page, click on “Copy,” and paste the URL in your reply to us.
How to reinstall the Mac app
Sometimes after reviewing a case, we may advise reinstalling Sketch. Please read this article on how to reinstall and ensure your plugins, libraries, and gradient presets are restored.
