New GIt clone, Unity 3.5.7 hangs on load: "Re-Serializing Assets"

Unity Engine
1

Hi all -

This feels like a thorny one, would truly appreciate any help!

TL;DR VERSION:
When I open the project in Unity, it seems to hang on load with “Re-serializing Assets…” in the progress bar.
Unity 3.5.7
Mac OS X 10.8.2

LONGER VERSION:
We use Git to track our files. The machine having trouble had its Hard Drive go bad, and it was reformatted, Mac OS X and software reinstalled, and the Project files redownloaded from our Git repo.

When I try to open the project, which was cloned directly from another developer’s machine in the same office, with the same version of Unity (Pro) running, it starts to load fine, and then the loading progress bar gets to about 90% done, and it says “Re-serializing Assets” in the dialog box, and the progress bar is about 90% done. It seems to flicker, as if it’s re-serializing every asset.

My first thought is that since we use Git, we have all gone into Project Settings → Editor, switched to “Meta Files” for source control and “Force Text” for serialization. That way Git can handle the files, deal with merge conflicts, etc. All standard, according to the Unity web site.

WHAT I’VE TRIED:
Since this machine had a fresh install of Unity, however, the first time I tried to open our project, I forgot to set the Project Settings → Editor to Meta / Force Text. So I thought it probably went back to the default which, I think, is “Disabled”/“Mixed”, or something. In that case, it probably tried to open our project, saw all these assets serialized as text, and said “Nah, screw that, I’m switching these back to binary.”

So, I:

  • Closed Unity (Force Quit)
  • Renamed the project folder (so that on next open it would prompt)
  • Create a new project
  • Switch the Project Settings → Editor to Meta / Force Text
  • Save the scene
  • Quit Unity
  • Rename our project folder back to the correct name
  • Start Unity and open the project
    Result: Same thing.

Then I thought “Wait - project settings are saved with the project. So when I opened it the first time, it should have already KNOWN that the files should be serialized to text, with meta files”. Sure enough, in the ProjectSettings/EditorSettings.asset file, it uses
serializedVersion 1
m_SerializationMode 2
Those correlate to the correct items in the pulldown menus, so while correlation isn’t causation, it sure looks good.

But, just to make sure, I deleted the EditorSettings.asset file, and redownloaded it from Git, to make sure I had the EXACT same file as the other developers, who are happily working away on our demo, which I have to show to the client…next week. Figures.

Short version - no difference.

At this point, I’m not sure where to poke next. Anyone have any ideas?

THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! I really appreciate it.
Aaron

2

This is really frustrating - I still cannot open our application. How does one get Unity’s attention on these boards? Is there a premium level of service we can pay for to upgrade or anything? This is a blocker for us.

Thanks,
Aaron

3

I’m having the exact same problem now… :frowning:

Have you been able to resolve it?

4

having the same issue, just with a different asset. yes… this is totally frustrating.

– edit: so … i did a ps -aux | grep unity and kill -9’d the PID’s for unity. Reopened unity, and it LOOKS ok for now… I have not built the project yet, so we’ll see.

– edit2: yep that did work. Open a terminal (mac), issue the command “ps -aux | grep unity” and press enter (no quotes), then make a note of the process ID numbers, and then execute “kill -9 XXXX XXXX” - where XXXX are the process ID’s.

NOTE: The process ID is the number just after your login name.