Fatal Error. Cannot open Krita

[Ryan_Goodnight]

Unfortunately, I don’t know which version of Krita I own so I’m not sure what I can or can’t do. I own an ASUS laptop with Windows 11.

A couple days ago I downloaded a desktop “ghost” character for because I thought it’d be cute. As you would after getting a desktop ghost, a lot of folders appeared on my home screen for various things. I thought I could clean this up by moving those folders along with the “Krita x64” folder in file manager to my desktop to documents, not aware that this could cause some problems. The next day I found that Krita’s icon did not load properly (though I could still open the program) and the ghost app (SSP) wasn’t working at all. I have poor memory and I’ve never understood how to work with computers like this, so I apologize that I can’t be more specific. I tried various ways to fix the icon, like scans from the Command Prompt, and nothing worked. At this point I’ve moved all the new folders back to my desktop and the desktop character works perfectly fine. Eventually a website said the “iconcache” file, I think, could be corrupted and I’d have to delete it, empty the recycling bin, and restart my computer. So, I did that. I came back to Krita and now I can’t open it at all.

It gives me:
Could not initialize the resource cache database. Connection error: Driver not loaded Driver not loaded

Krita will quit now.

Followed by:
Could not synchronize C:/Users/(my name)/AppData/Roaming/krita/ with the database
Could not synchronize C:/Users/(my name)/AppData/Roaming/krita/Krita_3_Default_Resources.bundle with the database
Could not synchronize C:/Users/(my name)/AppData/Roaming/krita/Krita_4_Default_Resources.bundle with the database
Could not synchronize C:/Users/(my name)/AppData/Roaming/krita/Krita_Artists_SeExpr_examples.bundle with the database
Could not synchronize C:/Users/(my name)/AppData/Roaming/krita/RGBA_brushes.bundle with the database
Could not synchronize memory with the database
Could not access brush tip metadata

Krita will quit now.

I am desperate to fix this. I don’t understand code or files. Deleting and reinstalling is not an option. I have an important art project I can only finish in Krita that took months to complete and now I’m terrified I’ll lose it.
Can someone send a picture of where every file for Krita needs to be, and is there even a way to fix this without getting rid of that project?

[sooz]

I don’t have a complete answer for you but wanted to say you will not lose your projects unless you have manually deleted files (and even then, if you’ve deleted stuff, you can probably find those files in the trashcan folder of your desktop).

If I were you, I’d navigate to whichever folder your projects are stored in (only you know where your art projects are – they will all be .kra files) and I’d send a copy of those .kra files to a cloud folder like google drive or DropBox. That way, no matter what you do in the coming hours, you’ll know you have an extra copy of your artwork.

PS (add): Hi @Michelist

[Michelist]

Hello Ryan_Goodnight, and welcome to the forum!

Okay, you messed up, that can happen. The fact that you want help from us is absolutely fine.
However, what I find very unusual is the fact that you, as someone who doesn’t want to know anything about computers, have scanned the computer from the command prompt, or wanted to. This is actually a contradiction in terms.

But anyway:
Now something positive, you don’t have to worry about your project, as long as you didn’t delete it together with the things in the trash as you emptied your trashcan, it still exists and can be saved. We should also be able to reanimate Krita if you let us. Which sounds a bit more dramatic, so in the context of your deletion action, that even Krita’s resource folder, which is usually never on the desktop, seems to be affected by your action.

Michelist, who again needed too much time to prescribe and translate

Add: Hello @sooz!
You have something overseen that could have been the fatal mistake that was already made… >>>

@Ryan_Goodnight

Eventually a website said the “iconcache” file, I think, could be corrupted and I’d have to delete it, empty the recycling bin, and restart my computer.

[AhabGreybeard]

@Ryan_Goodnight

As you would after getting a desktop ghost, a lot of folders appeared on my home screen for various things. I thought I could clean this up by moving those folders along with the “Krita x64” folder in file manager to my desktop to documents, not aware that this could cause some problems.

This is called a ‘nightmare scenario’.

As noted by @sooz and @Michelist, your personal artwork files/projects are not at risk.
They are saved/stored, by you, in locations that have nothing to do with the krita application itself or its config files or its resources.

If this happened to me, which it wouldn’t, I’d uninstall SSP and then delete anything associated with it. The I’d uninstall krita, if that was possible after what’s happened to it, then delete anything associated with krita, i.e. its config files and its resources folder.

Then I’d reinstall krita and run/check it. If it worked, I’d never do anything like that again.

[Michelist]

@AhabGreybeard

This is called a ‘nightmare scenario’.

@AhabGreybeard: Very good description!

@Ryan_Goodnight, the only thing that will help you here is a willingness to communicate and be open.
If you could tell us the name of your project or picture, then I can tell you what the search term should look like, with which you can find your file(s) again, should you not have made a fatal mistake by emptying the trash can with it/them in it. For this I need to know if you have only drive C:, or if you have more drives on your PC, and if you have more drives, on which of the drives you usually store your files created in Krita.

Since your Windows is still running, and your weird “ghost” was to reanimate, I can also help you with some probability to find back to a working Krita configuration.

However, based on your statement of having ‘touched’ even the “Krita (x64)” folder, one thing is for sure, you have dug very deep into the innards of your Windows 11 PC and the programs installed on it.
Furthermore, you most likely did not just ‘clean up’ the desktop, unless you installed Krita on the desktop instead of using the folder specified by the installation routine, because the “Programs” folder where Krita is usually installed is not on the desktop.
Likewise, your error messages “Could not initialize the resource cache database.” and “Could not synchronize…” and so on, also indicate that you ‘messed up’ something in Krita’s resource folder, and those paths you posted have absolutely nothing to do with the desktop. This also points to more than just your desktop as the scene of the crime.*

Due to the time of day, it is getting darker in Europe, I will probably not be able to help you until tomorrow. Please don’t make any panik actions while there is still a chance to save your project. If you have another hard disk (HDD/SSD) of sufficient size, it would make sense to make a copy of your Windows 11 hard disk. Unfortunately, I don’t know if you have such a disk, nor if you know what to back up.

Michelist

*Unfortunately, I have to recommend that it would be better to reinstall Windows completely. This requires that you back up your valuable user data, such as self-made images, texts, photos, Excel spreadsheets, and everything else you have on your PC that cannot be recovered by downloading it again from the WWW, to another medium with sufficient capacity (hard disk, SSD, memory card, USB stick), before you reinstall Windows, after a complete formatting of the C:\ drive.
This recommendation is only based on the description of your previous actions. It is not impossible that your PC will continue to work as it is now, but should problems with other programs on your PC accumulate, this is exactly what I would personally do. **

**by the way, those little buggers, like your “Ghost”, usually called “desktop companion”, are not infrequently the clandestine purveyors of unpleasant adjuncts labeled “malware”, i.e. viruses, Trojans, ransomware, etc. (the group of users who find such useless stuff great are a popular target among malware programmers, as the security awareness of the target group is on average non-existent (and the desktop companions are mostly not dependent on dependencies (that is: executable with the files found in their installation folder))).

[TheOutworlder]

Being actually familiar with SSP, not just as a user but as a ghost creator, I’m very curious how these two things came to be related at all. SSP is a portable app, it does not install files outside the folder it is extracted to. What “file manager” was used that these things came to be connected?

To others in the thread, the developers of the SSP baseware and the English language ghost development community have zero tolerance for malware. I imagine the Japanese community feels the same. Of course users should exercise caution when downloading software, but just because a piece of software is niche or unfamiliar doesn’t mean it’s just a vector for malware.

[Michelist]

Hello @TheOutworlder, and welcome to the forum!

I guess the main issue is the absolute absence of experience and the overall (mis-)understanding of the things needed to handle a PC when it comes to file-management, to install software and all the other things. @Ryan_Goodnight seemed in no way computer-savvy and has probably messed up many things with the blindly taken action you can read of above.
If there is or is not malware in that ghost is something I can not tell, but that many of these desktop companions are a vehicle to deliver malware, is a well known fact. That does not mean every desktop companion is malware, but one should be cautious and check these things before installing.

Michelist