[reemas]

i installed it. i think it made my mac help stop working and since im a new switcher its a pain in the ass that mac help wont load.
anyways i tried to uninstall it, i just dragged the whole palm desktop folder to the trash. i tried emptying the trash but a few items wont delete i get messages like:
"The operation cannot be completed because the item "USBNotifier" is in use."

I just clicked on "Continue"
and then this appears:

""The operation cannot be completed because the item "Palm Desktop Background" is in use."

i get about 5 or 6 others and finally it stops.

i decided to use iSync but it says I need Palm's Hotsync manager to install a device. so now what? do i reinstall palm desktop just to use iSync with iCal?

how do I get rid of the Palm Desktop folder in my trash?
please help.
thanks!

[CharlesS]

I don't think Palm Desktop is the reason your Mac Help won't load, nor that trashing it will help. But if you do want to delete it, probably the easiest way would be to open the app and turn off the background stuff. If that doesn't work, you can use the Terminal or Force Delete (which you can find at http://www.versiontracker.com/).

Before you do all that, though, could you please try this, and let me know what happens?

1. Launch the Console application in /Applications/Utilities.

2. Try to launch Mac Help.

3. Look in the Console to see if an error appeared. If so, post it here.

[reemas]

no error message, but even the console help wont load. what happens is it loads and the immediately closes.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by reemas:
no error message, but even the console help wont load. what happens is it loads and the immediately closes.

That's odd. Try launching the Terminal app (also in /Applications/Utilities) and typing this:

/System/Library/CoreServices/Help\ Viewer.app/Contents/MacOS/Help\ Viewer

See if you get any errors. If nothing shows up, the next thing I'd try would be to trash these files and folders:

In the ~/Library/Preferences folder, trash the following:

Apple Help Prefs
com.apple.help.plist
com.apple.helpui.plist
com.apple.helpviewer.plist

In ~/Library/Caches, trash the following:

com.apple.helpui

See if that helps at all.

[reemas]

i ran the terminal command, and it worked fine, the help viewer launched.

then in ~/Library/Preferences i deleted the files, and i tried launching the mac help window from finder and it loaded and the dissappeared like usual. but then i deleted the dir from ~/Library/Caches and now it works fine (it launches without closing from the finder menu bar).

any ideas why?

thanks for your help!

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by reemas:
i ran the terminal command, and it worked fine, the help viewer launched.

then in ~/Library/Preferences i deleted the files, and i tried launching the mac help window from finder and it loaded and the dissappeared like usual. but then i deleted the dir from ~/Library/Caches and now it works fine (it launches without closing from the finder menu bar).

any ideas why?

thanks for your help!

Dunno, sounds like corrupted cache files were causing it to crash at startup. Trashing the cache causes a new, clean one to get rebuilt.

So, since it sounds like everything is working now, time to relax! Take comfort in the fact that on Windows you might have needed a clean reinstall to fix that.

[cpac]

This really doesn't sound like a cache problem at all to me

Originally posted by reemas:
i installed it. i think it made my mac help stop working and since im a new switcher its a pain in the ass that mac help wont load.
anyways i tried to uninstall it, i just dragged the whole palm desktop folder to the trash. i tried emptying the trash but a few items wont delete i get messages like:
"The operation cannot be completed because the item "USBNotifier" is in use."

I just clicked on "Continue"
and then this appears:

""The operation cannot be completed because the item "Palm Desktop Background" is in use."

i get about 5 or 6 others and finally it stops.

The reason for this is that Palm Desktop installs a number of files and a small program or two that run in the background all the time in order to enable hotsyncing. To delete these files, you'll need to go into your System Preferences -> Accounts -> (your account) -> Startup Items and remove any of the palm-related things that appear there, then log-out/log-in and attempt to delete the things again.

i decided to use iSync but it says I need Palm's Hotsync manager to install a device. so now what? do i reinstall palm desktop just to use iSync with iCal?

how do I get rid of the Palm Desktop folder in my trash?
please help.
thanks!

Yep, iSync requires the Palm programs to sync with Palm devices.

Your best bet is to trash everything Palm-related, then reinstall Palm Desktop, then install the iSync palm conduit, and then set everything up in iSync.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by cpac:
This really doesn't sound like a cache problem at all to me

Um, unless I'm reading his response incorrectly, it looks like trashing the cache solved his problem, which means that it was a cache problem.

[reemas]

i think cpac was addressing the problems uninstalling palm desktop i.e. not a cache problem and CharlesS was addressing the mac help loading problem, i.e. a cache problem. thanks for the help.

but i think i uninstalled palm desktop incorrectly. how do you uninstalling somethiong on os x? i dragged the palm folder to the trash but that just left my with other hidden palm things, like in start up and a folder in my documents that i just discovered.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by reemas:
but i think i uninstalled palm desktop incorrectly. how do you uninstalling somethiong on os x? i dragged the palm folder to the trash but that just left my with other hidden palm things, like in start up and a folder in my documents that i just discovered.

Most apps on Mac OS X take a simple drag-and-drop to install. Applications installed in this way can be removed by dragging and dropping to the Trash. For applications which use an installer, like Palm, the installer often has an uninstall feature, if you just double-click the installer and look around for an option to uninstall.

AFAICT, though, the only things Palm has installed other than a folder in Documents is a folder in Application Support, which you shouldn't need to worry about removing. There is a Palm conduit in /System/Library/SyncServices, but that is installed by Apple, not Palm, and should not be removed.

HTH,
Charles

[cpac]

Originally posted by reemas:
ibut i think i uninstalled palm desktop incorrectly. how do you uninstalling somethiong on os x? i dragged the palm folder to the trash but that just left my with other hidden palm things, like in start up and a folder in my documents that i just discovered.

For most applications, just dragging the application to the trash is all you need to do.

For some programs though, especially those that interface with unique hardware (as Palm Desktop does) you need to find everything associated with the program and drag those things to the trash.

Palm may provide an uninstaller - I don't know (they should, since they put things weird places), but you can instead simply run a search for "palm" and/or "hotsync" and delete all the files that are found.