Logic 10.5.1 All Plugins and Virtual Instruments Defaulting to Controls View

If anyone's still watching this thread... I finally figured it out, it was My Own Darn Fault™. :)

The problem was that I installed a system utility called BetterTouchTool - it lets you do all kinds of custom configuring for input devices (I actually installed it to inhibit Magic Mouse scrolling when the mouse button is down, because the scrolling drives me nuts when I'm trying to move things in the arrange or piano roll windows). I ended up calling Apple a couple of times, and though they didn't exactly figure it out (not that they should have; they didn't know about the extension), they were very helpful and patient, and didn't charge me.

Anyhow, I believe the root of the issue was that BetterTouchTool was confusing/overriding my system Accessibility prefs, making it think that I wanted the computer to be able to speak to me. As a result, it forced the plugs to stay in controls view so that all controls would have text that it could identity and speak (fancy plug-in GUI's are just a graphic with words imbedded in the artwork, so they're not decipherable if you wanted the computer to speak to you).

Once I disabled BetterTouchTool, plug-in views went back to normal (and oddly, I could re-enable it, and everything worked after that). What was very helpful in diagnosing it was that Apple support had me try Logic with a test user (System Preferences\Users and Groups\ create a test user, switch to this user, etc.) and it worked fine, because BetterTouchTool wasn't enabled for the test user.

I deleted "com.apple.logic10.plist" file and restarted my Mac and it didn't fix it. When I open a plugin, I get this dialog. 

• If I click cancel, the plug opens in GUI mode as it should, but this dialog opens every time I try to open a plugin (clicking “Do Not Show…” doesn’t make a difference).

• If I click OK, it enables the Pref>Disp>Mixer “Open In Controls View” pref, and plugs open in control view. If I disable the the pref, it turns itself back on as soon as I exit the window - all plugs still open in controls view, and if I go back into the Pref>Disp>Mixer window, it’s enabled again. Grrr.  

At this point, it’s looking like the only fix would be to go back to Logic 10.5.0, but I didn’t save that version, b/c I (foolishly) didn’t expect a minor bugfix update to create a new issue.

I reinstalled Logic and trashed both the "com.apple.logic10.plist" and "com.apple.logic.pro.cs" files. Still did not fix it; it's maddening. I think my only choice is to call Apple support and pay them for the privilege of helping beta test their buggy software.

I just spoke with support; the guy was really nice and helpful. He remote desktopped into my machine, but couldn't figure it out either; he's gonna research it further and get back to me. They did not charge me. :)

I'm still in Mojave, so good to know that I may not be able to use BTT when I finally give in and update to Catalina/Big Sur/Fresno/Inglewood, whatever it is by then. :P I'm not convinced this is specifically a Logic 10.5.1 issue, it just happened to coincide with when I updated. I should've known better - when something doesn't work right, ALWAYS ask, "what have I recently changed?"

For the record, while I had Apple on the phone, I did rattle them about inhibiting screen scrolling with finger on Magic Mouse when the mouse button is down. I always feel like the screen is "running away" from me when I'm moving stuff as result, and I can't believe they haven't built this into the system Magic Mouse control api. (This is why I was using BTT in the first place.)