Ableton Forum

Sorry to discover that Live 12 no longer will offer a downloadable reference manual. This is absurd. How is a person supposed to search for a phrase? The current online reference manual is not going to work for me and hundreds of others. Try searching for a phrase. There is no search capability. ARE YOU KIDDING ME????? If they do not change course and release a downloadable PDF reference manual as they have for all previous versions my relationship with Ableton will be over!!!

Wtf come on!

The online version used to have a search box (until Live 9 I think), no idea why they removed it, they should definitely add it back (even if PDF also comes back).

Search function was probably too expensive to maintain

they moved all that functionality into the new browser, so they had to remove it from the manual

Where have they said that? The word I got was the manual will be released soon.

You know I was going to say you could search google with the tags for the specific part of the manual you wanted, but Google intentionally broke their boolean search tags, so it's near useless for this now.


Emailing them to get a PDF manual back is a worthy thing to do.

Hey everyone, this is on the radar, sorry for the hassle.
FYI, the manual is in the application package (right-click Live's icon in the Finder > show package content > contents > LegalandDocs... but it's still the L11 one.

[jur] wrote: ↑

Tue Mar 12, 2024 3:31 am

Hey everyone, this is on the radar, sorry for the hassle.
FYI, the manual is in the application package (right-click Live's icon in the Finder > show package content > contents > LegalandDocs... but it's still the L11 one.

Just been told by support today that they are definitely not planning on “offering” a manual so I dont know think your information is up-to-date.

Very disappointed - I use Ableton on my laptop quite often when I have no access to the internet.

I guess Ableton just expect us to guess how to use a premium product or use a manual for a previous version that doesnt describe how to use the new features and changed UI. (I’m happy with 12 but really cross that there is no manual available that you can print or use offline).

I know this is not what you guys are after but will the free gemini AI be of no help? When it comes to searching, it should be superior to ctrl+F.
Just a thought.

I wonder if Ableton are planning on selling a paper manual - that may explain why they arent offering a free pdf download !!

I just dont get the argument that support told me: "we currently do not plan to offer one because we do not have the resources to maintain both the online version and a PDF version.” That’s just nonsense !!! They dont have the resources to save text in different formats !!!

forestcaver wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 14, 2024 2:23 pm

I wonder if Ableton are planning on selling a paper manual - that may explain why they arent offering a free pdf download !!

They stopped selling paper manuals several years ago - the last I have is from Live 8.
But I would certainly miss having the convenience of a handy pdf version. Maybe I'm just old-school.

I'm also disappointed that no manual is going to be released. At the very least they should print a separate amendment to ad the latest new upgrades. At this point I guess I'll have to rely on Youtube, and other Ableton content creators for all the new possibilities.

lincolnkid wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 14, 2024 3:04 pm

forestcaver wrote: ↑

Thu Mar 14, 2024 2:23 pm

I wonder if Ableton are planning on selling a paper manual - that may explain why they arent offering a free pdf download !!

They stopped selling paper manuals several years ago - the last I have is from Live 8.
But I would certainly miss having the convenience of a handy pdf version. Maybe I'm just old-school.

Yeah - I know, but it’s just such a ridiculously odd thing to say about not publishing a pdf that it made me wonder....

I struggle to understand how they dont have resources to publish the html content as a pdf - it’s so odd that it just sounds like BS, so I was trying to think of commercial reasons not to allow customers to read a decent offline manual - making money may possibly be one reason...

forestcaver wrote: ↑

Fri Mar 15, 2024 3:12 pm

...so I was trying to think of commercial reasons not to allow customers to read a decent offline manual - making money may possibly be one reason...

They're taking a financial cut from all the youtube and tiktok videos out there explaining the new features in the absence of a proper manual.

Oh, I'm joking, just in case someone takes this seriously.