[reidspice]

i've run into a problem where, from boot to boot, i can't launch any apps when i login to 10.1. the icons will just bounce and bounce and then eventually stop bouncing. sometimes the dock will also seem to crash. force quit doesn't bring up any dialogue box. i usually just have to cold reboot the machine because i can't even get a shutdown button up or get a terminal window to launch.

oddly enough, mail.app usually seems to work even if other apps don't. at first i thought that only cocoa apps would launch but when this happens i can't get terminal to launch either (and it's cocoa right?). i had this problem on 5g64 and "fixed" it by creating a new user and logging on with a different profile (after reinstalling osx and getting really frustrated because it didn't help). now, with 5m28 on a different partition it seems this old problem is back to haunt me. the weird thing is that sometimes things will work fine and other times they won't - but without any patterns that i can find. seems to be "flip a coin when you boot and see what happens."

anyone seen this before or have any ideas on how to fix it? having already reinstalled my os i don't want to just keep creating new user accounts every time i run into this mess.. somehow it seems i keep corrupting something in my profile.

thanks,
reid

[pierce1979]

I also have the problem on my iMac 700 with 10.1.1. I have not figured out what is causing it.

[malvolio]

If you have installed iTunes 2, open the Login pane of your System Prefs. If you see something called "iTunes Helper" in there, delete it. That little SOB is causing all sorts of grief.

[reidspice]

Originally posted by malvolio:
<STRONG>If you have installed iTunes 2, open the Login pane of your System Prefs. If you see something called "iTunes Helper" in there, delete it. That little SOB is causing all sorts of grief.
</STRONG>

hmm.. i'll try that but this problem actually predates itunes2 by a few months. first had it with 10.1 (5g64) and now with 10.1.1 as well.

thanks!

reid

so, what exactly does iTunesHelper do? I reinstalled everything 3 times yesterday fighting this problem. I thought something didn't like my kensington trackball drivers.

[reidspice]

it's a horrible workaround but i have found that creating a new user and logging on as that user will let you launch apps consistently. at least for a while.

the thing that's really annoying about this problem is that it isn't consistent. sometimes i can boot up and everything is fine. then maybe the next boot (or 2 boots) i won't be able to launch anything except mail.

i've been experimenting recently with letting the machine sit for a minute before i try to open anything and maybe that's working. or maybe i'm just getting lucky and waiting has nothing to do with it.

to the other folks who are seeing this: can you typically open mail.app but not other apps the way i can? just curious if you're seeing the exact same behavior. weird.

i'm on a blue & white g3 with 512 mb ram btw.

-reid

[Mercator]

I'm intesely interested in this topic because I'm having exactly the same problem. I just reinstalled 10.1 and everything hums along fine until I boot up in OS 9, then go back to 10.1. Very frustrating.


My setup:
QS 867, OS 10.1

Apps that won't launch: IE 5.1, iTunes 2.0.1, Stuffit Expander, iMovie.

Apps that launch: Clock, Quicktime player, System prefs, Preview, Internet connect

[Spliff]

Okay, I've seen this problem since v. 10.0. I complained about it to Apple then and it still isn't fixed. If you have carbon applications set to launch at startup (via the login panel), try disabling them. Also, at login, don't immediately launch a bunch of apps. Wait for the dock to appear and everything to load before launching your apps. This should eliminate or greatly reduce the occurrence of this problem.

The creator of DragThing was getting emails from users of his software complaining about this problem. DragThing has an option for automatically starting up at login. The following is from the FAQ at the DragThing homepage:

Q: I'm seeing a problem with DragThing not running properly at login under Mac OS X 10.1. It just sits there without opening and I can't kill it. What can I do?

A: As far as I have been able to work out, this is a bug in Mac OS X 10.1 and 10.1.1. Specifically it seems to be a HFS filesystem locking problem deep in the Mac OS X kernel.

It doesn't seem to be a problem with DragThing, because at the point it happens, none of DragThing's code has actually been executed, and it's been reproduced with other applications like BBEdit too. It initially seems to affects Carbon applications, and it will spread to Cocoa applications while the system has been running for a while. The only thing you can do at this point is press the hardware restart button.

The iTunesHelper from iTunes 2 which is automatically set to run on login seems to be a way to reproduce the bug easily, but it happens with other startup items as well, such as the Kensington MouseWorks driver.

I believe if you manually run DragThing after startup, you won't see it, but I know that's annoying. Removing the iTunesHelper, which as far as I know is only required for the iPod, is also a workaround. Some people have also suggested that reordering the list such that DragThing appears at the beginning or end helps. Sometimes, it will work fine if you just reboot.

I have logged this problem with Apple as bug number #2803557.

[reidspice]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Spliff:
[QB]Okay, I've seen this problem since v. 10.0. I complained about it to Apple then and it still isn't fixed. If you have carbon applications set to launch at startup (via the login panel), try disabling them. Also, at login, don't immediately launch a bunch of apps. Wait for the dock to appear and everything to load before launching your apps. This should eliminate or greatly reduce the occurrence of this problem.

[snip]


thank you SO much. this explanation sounds like it's right on the money and sure enough i do have loadindock, thermoindock, and the entourage helper set to launch at startup. just disabled them.

i am keeping launchbar loading at startup because i think it's a cocoa app. not positive but i think so. and if you haven't used launchbar i recommend giving it a try - it's a really innovative piece of software. read the reviews on versiontracker: almost everyone since october has given it 5 stars (pretty unusual for that site). okay, end of plug. have a nice holiday.

THANKS!

-reid

[Chris Allbritton]

thank you SO much. this explanation sounds like it's right on the money and sure enough i do have loadindock, thermoindock, and the entourage helper set to launch at startup. just disabled them.

i am keeping launchbar loading at startup because i think it's a cocoa app. not positive but i think so. and if you haven't used launchbar i recommend giving it a try - it's a really innovative piece of software. read the reviews on versiontracker: almost everyone since october has given it 5 stars (pretty unusual for that site). okay, end of plug. have a nice holiday.

THANKS!

-reid

I was having this trouble, but i think it was MouseWorks that was causing the problem. I moved it the last thing in my Login panel list and the problem has disappeared.

[ndptal85]

I don't know about you guys but if I had problems like this for so long I would have long since re-formatted and re-installed.

[reidspice]

Originally posted by ndptal85:
<STRONG>I don't know about you guys but if I had problems like this for so long I would have long since re-formatted and re-installed.</STRONG>

as i said in my original post, i had already reinstalled.

and i had the same problem with 2 different installs of 10.1 so i really don't think a reinstall is gonna fix it. from what has been said in this thread, this sounds like a bug in osx so reinstalling is just going to give you a fresh copy of the bug.



-r