Couchcowboy

Q: Finder Frustrations

I have about a half dozen Finder Frustrations (I'd call them Finder Funnies, but they're not that funny anymore). My downloads folder (and others) always rearranges content into alphabetical order no matter what I do in any settings. It also rearranges all folders in that folder as well. I upgraded from Snow Leopard, hoping to escape some Finder annoyances, only to gain additional ones (for example: https://discussions.apple.com/message/12085356#12085356). I've found forums regarding files spontaneously re-arranging themselve alphabetically, but not some of the following:

 

New Finder Frustrations include:

 

1) Finder opens the WRONG folder at times upon dragging an item onto a folder you want to move something to. You need to be VERY CAREFUL here, folks, because I had to use Spotlight to find a file when Finder dropped it into the wrong folder and I didn't notice. Fortunately, I remembered the name of the file and could find it misfiled in a totally unrelated folder (and, no, I didn't drop it in the wrong folder; I've seen this bug multiple times and now never just drop any file onto a folder; I wait for it to open before dropping to be sure it's the correct folder and often it is not! When it opens the wrong folder it opens another folder somewhere in the same general area). This seems to happen in my download folder A LOT.

 

2) Upon dropping a file or dragging a photo from your browser into a folder, Finder jumps to another location in that folder. You then have to go find the file you just moved or copied in order to perform any actions upon it, such as rename the file. If you have a folder with lots of other files in it, that can be a big pain in the hiney.

 

3) Not sure if this is a part of Finder, but QuickLook now initially shows a grey box upon first hitting the shift key when trying to view a photo (see https://discussions.apple.com/message/16046574#16046574 for example image). I can close QuickLook and hit shift again, and it opens appropriately. In other words, I have to highlight a file, then hit the shift key three times to view it. Annoying.

 

4) I'm also not sure if this is still present in Lion (I'm waiting to see; it was definitely a problem for me in SL), but the Finder will move a newly named file to another part of folder when the folder is opened at a later date. I find this on my computer very commonly, but since it was doing it in SL, not sure yet if it's still doing it Lion.

 

I will say that a big problem I had in Snow Leopard, pixelated icons, seems to be impoved in Lion, at least at this point. Unfortunately, one of my biggest problems with Snow Leopard, losing ethernet connection upon awakening, is still there, though it seems less often. But that's for another forum (https://discussions.apple.com/message/16047173#16047173).

 

Does anyone else encounter any of the above? Better yet, do you have any solutions?

Posted on Sep 3, 2011 1:27 PM

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Q: Finder Frustrations

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  • Helpful answers

  • by macjack,Helpful

    macjack macjack Sep 3, 2011 1:44 PM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 9 (55,709 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 3, 2011 1:44 PM in response to Couchcowboy

    It sounds like your Finder preferences are wonky. Go to /Users/yourname/ then from your "Go" menu press option key and choose "Library"/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist and com.apple and com.apple.sidebars.plist.

    Delete those. Then log out and back in or restart.

  • by thomas_r.,

    thomas_r. thomas_r. Sep 3, 2011 2:10 PM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 7 (30,924 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 3, 2011 2:10 PM in response to Couchcowboy

    None of that is normal.  If macjack's solutions don't work, try repairing your hard drive.  You may have serious directory problems.  If you have already moved to Lion (sounds like it), reboot while holding down command-R and use Disk Utility to repair the hard drive.

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Sep 5, 2011 8:59 AM in response to macjack
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 5, 2011 8:59 AM in response to macjack

    macjack,

    I should have noted that I had already deleted the finder.plist a couple of times. I also checked for corrupted pref files with Onyx. Additionally, I've deleted the .DS files on a couple of the folders that are the most egregious offenders. However, I had not deleted the other two you listed. I'll delete all three and give 'er a try. I'll be back with ya on that. Thanks! Can't tell you how much I hope that works.

     

    Thomas A Reed,

    I am using Lion, 10.7.1. I check my hard drive with Onyx pretty regularly, but will check it again if the above doesn't help. Thanks!

     

    CCB

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Sep 14, 2011 1:48 PM in response to macjack
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 14, 2011 1:48 PM in response to macjack

    macjack,

    I deleted the finder plist and the sidebar plist (could not find a com.apple plist you mentioned) and it seemed to improve some things, but not all. The jumping about when dragging items is better, but not completely eliminated, the folders open more appropriately when draggin an item onto them, but, alas, wrong folders still occasionally open. QuickLook was better for a brief period of time, but the longer I used the Mac, the worse it gets and it's now back to opening a grey box on first clicking the space bar. The most frustrating thing of all, though, is the rearranging of files and folders. Apparently, this is a big problem for others as well ( see https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3210568). I could really like Lion if it wasn't for all this nonsense.

     

    Thomas Reed,

    Harddrive checks out OK.

     

    Thanks to you both.

     

    CCB

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Sep 21, 2011 1:59 PM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 21, 2011 1:59 PM in response to Couchcowboy

    Anyone else?

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Apr 19, 2012 6:18 AM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Apr 19, 2012 6:18 AM in response to Couchcowboy

    Not sure what this means, but I've noticed that some of the Finder Frustrations seem to occur when Firefox is running. Specifically, files and folders move or won't stay in place when Firefox is open, but seem to work fine when Firefox is closed! What's up with that? The SlowLook (formerly known as QuickLook) opens with a grey box whether Firefox is open or not. It tends to work OK for a short period of time after restarting Finder, which I have to do fairly often (Finder begins to have the spinning beach ball when you try to do the least little thing, such as move a file a few millimeters, rename a file, etc.). I've also noticed that upon selecting more than one file, hitting Space, that SlowLook doesn't always offer me the "view multiple file" option in the title bar. Preview crashes a lot, which is another discussion, I suppose. Boy, this is so frustrating.

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Aug 21, 2012 10:40 AM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Aug 21, 2012 10:40 AM in response to Couchcowboy

    I was hoping against hope that Mountain Lion would magically cure my Finder Frustrations, but, alas, 'twas not to be. Now my downloads folder keeps rearranging itself alphabetically A few, but not all, additional folders have done so as well. The downloads folder does it regularly, but not every time.  I have view options set as "arrange by NONE" and have been to sure to rearrange files once with "Clean up by..." and NOT "Arrange by...", but upon downloading a file, the files suddenly go from where I've place them (my 'to be installed" stack, my "to be deleted" stack, etc,) back to alphabetically! Very annoying!!!!!!!!! I have deleted my Finder prefs to no avail. The other new crazy thing since Mountain Lion is that now upon using Spotlight to find an item, hitting "return" doesn't always open that file! I sometimes have to click on the item instead, or I can scroll down or up from the item, then go back to the item and it will then allow me to hit return to open said file or folder. Annoying.  SlowLook works OK as long as I don't have but one user account active, otherwise you get the grey box frequently (see https://discussions.apple.com/message/18761845#18761845). Forget Fast User Switching, even if you have max RAM in your iMac (I do).  While this may not be Finder related, the computer still can't connect to Ethernet after awakening from sleep. Seems like we go two steps forward and three steps back. Have I said, "Annoying" yet? (I always try to work "annoying" in at least three times every post).

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Sep 15, 2012 8:52 AM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Sep 15, 2012 8:52 AM in response to Couchcowboy

    My downloads folder continues to rearrange itself alphabetically and it does it in both an administrative account and a non-administrative account. This happens after downloading a file to the downloads folder. I've actually watched it suddenly and spontaneously switch files and folders to alphabetically when something is downloading.  A new wrinkle is the downloads folder now switched itself to "show item info", even though I UNCHECK "show item info" in Finder prefs over and over! In fact, I have NEVER checked "show item info" in my entire 20 something years of Mac computing. It just switches it back! Again, this is in both user accounts. Annoying, annoying, annoying (that's my three times).

    Anyone have any ideas? It seems the downloads pref reverts back to whatever its been frozen on. It sometimes takes it a minute or two, but it always goes back to "Clean up by Name" and "show item info". It seems like Mountain Lion takes one step forward and two steps back.

    Any suggestions would be appreciated.

  • by nikicampos,

    nikicampos nikicampos Oct 4, 2012 9:16 PM in response to Couchcowboy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 4, 2012 9:16 PM in response to Couchcowboy

    I have the exact same problem since I updated to ML, downloads folder keep rearranging itself by name, I hate that, and also it changes to show info...

     

    I've reintalled ML 3 or 4 times, and its always the same, it just NOT works.

  • by Couchcowboy,

    Couchcowboy Couchcowboy Oct 7, 2012 4:23 PM in response to nikicampos
    Level 1 (36 points)
    Mac OS X
    Oct 7, 2012 4:23 PM in response to nikicampos

    I share your pain. What's really interesting is that I've had this rearranging thing happen in other folders, but I could hit the back button, then the forward button and it would revert to how I had the folders/files originally arranged! Like it forgot for a minute how I wanted them!  Also, since updating to ML, I can no longer hit the enter button to open a file or folder after finding it in Spotlight, at least on many occasions. I have to hit my down arrow key, then my up arrow key to reselect the found item, then hit enter and it will open. Weird. I frequently have to restart Finder after only a short time of use, because I start getting the spinning beach ball with trying to do even the most mundane of activities, such as drag a file to another part of the same window. I have max RAM in my iMac, so it's not that, BTW.

    See Derek Currie's post at bottom of page at this link:

    https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3210568?start=90&tstart=0