~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.help.plist and Apple Help

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Level 6

11,459 points

~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.help.plist and Apple Help

I've got a weird problem that is likely the result of sharing preference files. If I open the Apple Help menu, it tries to connect to an old IP address to a computer at work that died many years ago. Then after a few minutes when the connection fails, it will load the local help file.

I deleted ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.help.plist and the new one generated creates the right paths, but it seems like a different path is being consulted by default.

I looked in the system log and it mentioned a file /etc/defaultdomain but that is empty. Is there something else that is messing this up?

G5 2x2.5 GHZ and a few others, Mac OS X (10.5.4)

Posted on Sep 7, 2008 6:32 PM

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Answer 1

HazyRigby

Level 2

404 points

Sep 7, 2008 11:23 PM in response to Bill Scott

Hi Bill,

You could also try com.apple.helpviewer.plist (in ~/Library/Preferences). Have you noted whether this is system-wide or restricted to your user account? I'd create a test account (if you don't have another on your system) and try the help menus. If they're messed up over there, then fixing things in your user folder won't help. The only system resource I could find that seems remotely relevant is /System/Library/LaunchAgents/com.apple.helpdata.plist, but I'd be verrrry careful about messing around with stuff in your System folder.

Hope that helps!
—Hazy

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