Author Topic: Weird behavior in dock folder  (Read 3835 times)

Offline Paddy

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #15 on: May 11, 2012, 07:49:29 AM »
So, Kim, if you just try to drag your Documents folder off the Dock (no need to drag it to the Trash) it doesn't go "poof" in a little cloud of dust like it should? If that's the case, then I think you've got some corruption somewhere.

1. Try repairing permissions
2. Restart (I assume you've probably tried this at some point)
3. Login as different user and see if the behaviour persists or not
4. Run Onyx and clear caches etc.

You might also want to run Disk Utility and verify your drive. Strange behaviour can definitely result from a corrupted drive and/or a failing drive.

Do those things one by one and test after each.
« Last Edit: May 11, 2012, 07:51:52 AM by Paddy »
"If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into committees. That'll do them in." ~Author unknown •iMac 5K, 27" 3.6Ghz i9 (2019) • 16" M1 MBP(2021) • 9.7" iPad Pro • iPhone 13

Offline Xairbusdriver

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #16 on: May 11, 2012, 09:25:19 AM »
QUOTE
I'll try that if you tell me where to find it.

Finder->Preferences->Advanced->Show all filename extensions

QUOTE
This is what I've deleted:
com.apple.dock.db and com.apple.dock.plist.
As I meant to say, those affect Finder and the Dock on the whole. Those apps are operating normally. It is just that one Folder/directory that is having this problem, not all folders/Dock items. That's why I suggested deleting the .DS_Store file even though it basically is just a database of where items are to be displayed in any window. I'm just hoping that it may also control this misbehavior. It will be automatically rebuilt as soon as you delete it, just like the Finder restarts when you Quit it.

BTW, you cannot, normally, delete a System owned file via Finder. "'Documents' can’t be modified or deleted because it’s required by Mac OS X." It's not nice to TRY to fool Mother Mac! nono.gif
THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF COUNTRIES
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And the United States = The Banana system
CAUTION! Childhood vaccinations cause adults! :yes:

Offline kimmer

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #17 on: May 11, 2012, 12:14:50 PM »
QUOTE
So, Kim, if you just try to drag your Documents folder off the Dock (no need to drag it to the Trash) it doesn't go "poof" in a little cloud of dust like it should?

No, it poofs. It's an alias and behaves properly. Other than not being searchable by letter(s).

QUOTE
Finder->Preferences->Advanced->Show all filename extensions

Already checked. I still can't seem to find that preference. Is it a hidden file?

Okay ... is this the correct way to find/remove this file?
http://www.wikihow.com/Remove-.Ds_Store-Files-on-Mac-Os-X
« Last Edit: May 11, 2012, 12:28:43 PM by kimmer »

Offline Xairbusdriver

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #18 on: May 11, 2012, 02:03:26 PM »
Haven't looked at your link yet, waiting to pick up the Grand daughter at school, but I think you need to have a finder window open to see the actual file. And it may be greyed like ones you'd think you can't touch. But it is easily deleted without even entering your admin password. However, in Snow Leopard, you may not have that preference. Try setting your Finder view to Columns first... Just for a few moments, I wouldn't think of asking you to do something more efficiently than you want! tongue.gif
« Last Edit: May 11, 2012, 09:05:53 PM by Xairbusdriver »
THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF COUNTRIES
Those that use metric = #1 Measurement system
And the United States = The Banana system
CAUTION! Childhood vaccinations cause adults! :yes:

Offline kimmer

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #19 on: May 11, 2012, 07:24:49 PM »
QUOTE(Xairbusdriver @ May 11 2012, 12:03 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>
Haven't looked at your link yet, waiting to pick up the Grand daughter at school, but I think you need to have a finder window open to see the actual file. And it may be greyed like ones you'd think you can't touch. But it is easily deleted without even entering your admin password. However, in Snow Leopard, you may not have that preference. Try setting your Finder view to Columns first... Just for a few moments, I wouldn't think of asking you to do something more efficiently than you want! ;p

Okay, I tried columns and I'm still not seeing this file.

Offline Xairbusdriver

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #20 on: May 11, 2012, 09:14:41 PM »
QUOTE
I'm still not seeing this file.
You will never see it until you can see files starting with a period. Sorry about my missinformation about file extensions. blush-anim-cl.gif My bad. I think either Onyx or Cocktail can provide that capability. But I thought there was a pref in OS X that allowed it. Perhaps it's not even a solution to your misbehaving Dock iteration of the Documents folder. :headbash: Let me do some web surfing...

...later

OK, here is the Terminal command to allow seeing the .DS_Store (and all other 'hidden' files). Actually there are two commands
1. defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles TRUE
2. killall Finder
The first command changes the value stored in the string of the "com.apple.finder.plist" in the very first key of the dictionary from FALSE to TRUE. That's what "defaults write" means. The text after that command is the name of the .plist but without stat=ing the plist part (it's simply understood, by definition of the command). After the plist name is the "key" being changed. The last text is the value that you want to be inserted. In this case, it's a string. In many other places it's simply "<true/>" or "<false/>". Simple XML text that indicates YES/NO or TRUE/FALSE.

The second step doesn't have to be done in Terminal, you can also use the Force Quit command or even Activity Monitor. As you know, the Finder will automatically restart itself since the OS is pretty useless without all its functionality (a Finder window being just one thing it does).

As a matter of fact, you don't even need Terminal to use the first command. If you have a PLAIN TEXT editor, you can open the "com.apple.finder/plist" and edit the "FALSE" (that's usually there) to "TRUE" and save the file (without even the ".txt" suffix!). Now, Quit Finder any way you want. Open a new Finder window and you'll see the .DS_Store" file in every folder listing.
CODE
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>AppleShowAllFiles</key>
    <string>TRUE</string>
    <key>BackupProgressWindowLocation</key>
    <string>{1080, 353}</string>
    <key>BrowserWindowState</key>
    <array>
        <dict>
            <key>...

Whether this has anything to do with your problem is still an unknown, of course.

When you tire of seeing all the hidden files, just change that "TRUE" back to "FALSE" with whatever method you used to change it in the first place. And Quite Finder, again.

This is about as simple as I can make it and if you use copy and paste, doesn't even require typing in Terminal. thumbup.gif
« Last Edit: May 11, 2012, 10:02:21 PM by Xairbusdriver »
THERE ARE TWO TYPES OF COUNTRIES
Those that use metric = #1 Measurement system
And the United States = The Banana system
CAUTION! Childhood vaccinations cause adults! :yes:

Offline Paddy

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #21 on: May 12, 2012, 11:11:41 AM »
Kimmer, have you tried repairing permissions? While the .DS_store file could indeed be the issue and it certainly worth trying to remove it, there are the other things to try that I listed in my post above, if that doesn't work.
"If computers get too powerful, we can organize them into committees. That'll do them in." ~Author unknown •iMac 5K, 27" 3.6Ghz i9 (2019) • 16" M1 MBP(2021) • 9.7" iPad Pro • iPhone 13

Offline kimmer

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #22 on: May 12, 2012, 12:30:33 PM »
Paddy, I forgot about repairing permissions.

XABD, thanks.

I'll work on this later today.

Offline kimmer

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #23 on: May 12, 2012, 04:24:18 PM »
  • Permissions repaired and nothing showed for my Documents folder (but sure did have a lot of other stuff repaired!).
  • Deleted the .DS_store file and the system rebuilt it.
  • Restored all my files in the Documents folder as they were before, and it's still not working correctly.

I've now added files back and removed files and I've narrowed the culprit down to 1 or more of 216 files that I've always needed to clean up. tongue.gif  Guess now is the time.

Offline jchuzi

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #24 on: May 12, 2012, 04:40:19 PM »
To ease your mind about the possibly numerous permissions "repairs", read Mac OS X: Disk Utility's Repair Disk Permissions messages that you can safely ignore.
Jon

macOS 11.7.10, iMac Retina 5K 27-inch, late 2014, 3.5 GHz Intel Core i5, 1 TB fusion drive, 16 GB RAM, Epson SureColor P700, Photoshop CC, Lightroom CC, MS Office 365

Offline kimmer

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #25 on: May 12, 2012, 07:54:18 PM »
Thanks, Jon, that's what I saw. smile.gif

Offline jchuzi

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Weird behavior in dock folder
« Reply #26 on: May 13, 2012, 08:12:20 AM »
You're welcome. Be aware that you will see those "repairs" every time that you repair permissions. I wish that Apple would update Disk Utility so that it doesn't show these annoying messages.
Jon

macOS 11.7.10, iMac Retina 5K 27-inch, late 2014, 3.5 GHz Intel Core i5, 1 TB fusion drive, 16 GB RAM, Epson SureColor P700, Photoshop CC, Lightroom CC, MS Office 365