MacOS Catalina 'Verifying Files'

I have now spent 20 minutes trying to open one excel file on my iMac, a 2012 model that worked perfectly fine until I made the mistake of “upgrading” to Catalina. The computer is just completing the second round if “verifying” Excel. This verifying process happens repeatedly with Excel and other apps. Surprisingly, even with iPhotos, a native program. All comments in this chat point to a startling failure to plan and test. Or worse, a possible “Let them buy new machines” attitude. Is Apple doing anything to rectify this train wreck?

The suggestions made are, with due respect, completely useless. I just spent two hours online with Apple customer support, only to be told I need to talk to Microsoft about Office. I have Office 2016, continuously updated, including in order to operate in 64-bit Catalina realm. This is an Apple problem and Apple should fix it. When will patches or updates be sent to fix this problem. I work by the hour and have spent 3.5 hours messing with problems that, from a design and release standpoint, should never have occurred. Are there ANY real solutions to the "verifying program" loop? Even with restarts, shutdowns, quitting the programs and so on, the verifying programs problem makes the former user friendly nature of Mac very unhelpful. Any SOLUTIONS that work would be appreciated.

This is a follow up to yesterday's comments about useless suggestions. Here is another one: The apple tech -- after 1 hour and 50+ minutes online and on the phone -- abruptly said I would have to contact Microsoft customer support. I spent another two hours on a chat with an MS tech, turning the helm over to that person. It appeared toward the end that the verifying files issue might have been overcome with word, excel and power point. We had not yet gotten Outlook to open, but the tech declared victory and went home, suggesting that I try all four Office apps on my own. I have done that several times, following shutdowns and restarts, and quitting and attempting to reopen programs. The same problem persists: verifying files either takes about eight minutes to launch the program or, more common, the verifying files function runs but the program never opens. I am far from an expert, but it seems like the feature that allows programs to open when they are from a known independent developer does not work at all with MS Office. This is not a problem with MS Office; I have Office 2016, which has been continually updated in part to keep abreast of Apple's precipitous decisions to release massive system changes prematurely. Incidentally, while I took four minutes to type this, a miracle happened: After two unsuccessful attempts to launch Word, it finally launched. Better go before Catalina changes her mind. APPLE NEEDS TO FIX THIS. HOW CAN THIS BE COMMUNICATED TO APPLE? MR. DUNMOW?

This is a follow up to yesterday's comments about useless suggestions. Here is another one: The apple tech -- after 1 hour and 50+ minutes online and on the phone -- abruptly said I would have to contact Microsoft customer support. I spent another two hours on a chat with an MS tech, turning the helm over to that person. It appeared toward the end that the verifying files issue might have been overcome with word, excel and power point. We had not yet gotten Outlook to open, but the tech declared victory and went home, suggesting that I try all four Office apps on my own. I have done that several times, following shutdowns and restarts, and quitting and attempting to reopen programs. The same problem persists: verifying files either takes about eight minutes to launch the program or, more common, the verifying files function runs but the program never opens. I am far from an expert, but it seems like the feature that allows programs to open when they are from a known independent developer does not work at all with MS Office. This is not a problem with MS Office; I have Office 2016, which has been continually updated in part to keep abreast of Apple's precipitous decisions to release massive system changes prematurely. Incidentally, while I took four minutes to type this, a miracle happened: After two unsuccessful attempts to launch Word, it finally launched. Better go before Catalina changes her mind. APPLE NEEDS TO FIX THIS. HOW CAN THIS BE COMMUNICATED TO APPLE? MR. DUNMOW?

How can I remove Gatekeeper entirely? My computer now acts like it has a virus since it has to verify each and every time I open an application which then takes minutes for them to verify. On Top of that I then find out they didn't save my files because it didn't pop up asking for file permissions. This security update is overbearing to users and removes access to many useful software which are outside the Appstore. Stop treating the desktop like a phone.

It just took 5 minutes to start Logic Pro X because it went through another verifying process. It's not the first time I've used the app on my mid 2012 MacBook pro under Catalina. The most up to date apple piece of software and it's now slower than before. WOW! well done apple, Catalina sucks.

Numonex:

I have been doing a lot of research. You can evidently downgrade. It requires making a complete backup, erasing the mac, then restoring the computer to its status right before Catalina was installed. Deciding between that and throwing the iMac off the balcony was tough, but I found what might work for me on an interim basis: I have the iMac AND a MS Surface laptop, on which the MS Office apps are still lightning fast. I set up file sharing on the iMac just now and am going to wait and see if Apple fixes the problems they've created. The main things I lost or could not use with Catalina were Adobe Acrobat Pro X (DOA after Catalina) and MS Office (sometimes working, sometimes not, always at a snail's pace). With file sharing, I can access documents on the iMac, use and create pdf files, use the Office suite and move back and forth a lot more efficiently than waiting for "verifying files" to happen. If Apple and MS get together on this, the Office problem might get solved with an Apple patch. As for Acrobat Pro, Adobe was updating Acrobat for all prior MacOs changes, and the program seemed to work well. However, Adobe may have decided simply to ignore trying to update/upgrade for Catalina. Instead, you can only use Acrobat on the new OS if you buy Adobe's new version for $500, or subscribe to Adobe. However, Adobe has spawned a lot of competitors with cheaper alternatives to Acrobat that work on Catalina, such as PDF Studio Pro, a program I was already happy with before Office quit working right.

Sorry to be so wordy, but I've spent three days arriving at my own "wait and see." Without the MS laptop I might have opted for the balcony option. Meantime, let's see what Apple does...

Mike

The problem is that it isn’t just files and MS apps doing this, it’s Apple apps too.

and now it’s choking on another update that I am an hour into and it is still chunking along. This MacBook Air used to scream before this update.

I am about to go back to using Windows. At least you know it’s going to be buggy.

Same here... upgrading to 10.15.1 did nothing to fix this. Following Apple's technote on how to allow apps to run was useless. I am on a MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Late 2012)MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Late 2012) and worked flawlessly before the upgrade the Catalina. Now every apps gets "verified" before launching... every...single...time! So frustrating!!!!

RE: The 'verifying files' plague.

I'm not sure where I am inserting into this dialogue, but my principal problem has been with MS Office's incompatibility with OS Catalina in the late 2012 iMac. The problem persists, despite one update from Apple.

Here is a further update: I have spent about 4 hours online or on the phone with Apple Tech support, and nearly two more hours with Microsoft, all dealing with the MS Office "verifying files" problem. MS punted to Apple. Ten days or so ago Apple took a bunch of data from my computer for their engineers to analyze. I got a call today telling me that Apple and Microsoft are now working together to analyze this phenomenon and find a solution. I was assured that this is a serious matter being worked on actively, and that most of the time these sorts of problems produce a solution, usually implemented through an update.

Meanwhile, I'm not turning off the MS Office apps once they are loaded, but this too is causing problems. I may try to use Apple's "Pages" and "Numbers" on an interim basis, but since I don't want to learn new programs, I may stumble along with plan A for the time being.

Michael Mandig

I called Apple support and they guided me through a nondestructive reinstall of Catalina, which also rebuilt my trashed recovery volume. However, I still had to go through the verifying process for my non Apple apps.

i then rebooted into recovery mode where I turned off the SIP check. Problem solved!

None of the three techs took me through that process. It was never suggested. What is is disquieting about it in this day and age is turning off security checks. I'll stay in wait and see mode for now. The workaround turns out to be cumbersome, but sort of tolerable, and IO'm hopeful an update will be created to resolve the problem without the SIP compromise.