After installing Monterey, I can no longer save new files or "Save As" in many apps
My system
15" 2017 Macbook Pro running MacOS 12.0.1 - 16GB memory, 1TB SSD
Most current versions of all apps mentioned, updated prior to or during testing.
What it’s doing
Since the upgrade some (but not all) of my apps can no longer save files that are created within the app. In every case, the app just ignores the command. All other functions seem to work fine, including making changes to and saving existing files.
Those that have Cloud services can save to those services as well. The only problem is saving to disk.
Some can save PDFs to disk if I print to PDF using one of the “PDF Services” in this user folder:
~/Library/PDF Services
I haven’t yet tested the system-level ones here: /Library/PDF Services
But the normal “Save to PDF” function in the Print dialog does nothing.
Apps that have the problem
- The entire Adobe Creative Cloud suite
- The entire Microsoft 365 suite
- Spark (email app)
- Google Chrome (can’t download and save a new file — gets “stuck” but the browser still works, just shows a badge)
- ClickUp. app (probably based on Chrome’s engine)
- Evernote (can’t export notes as HTML or PDF)
- OmniGraffle
- OmniOutliner (also won’t close if you Duplicate a file, Apple-software style — no "Save As" command)
Apps that are able to save new files
- Finder
- All Apple office suite apps (Pages, Numbers, etc.)
- Dropbox (syncing works normally)
- Launchbar (probably uses native copy/move)
- Automator QuickAction service
- Skitch (from Evernote)
- Safari (can download but doesn’t allow me to specify a location for a Print to PDF)
- BusyCal (Print to PDF works)
- BBEdit
- Bear
- Firefox
- Handbrake
- Mindnode
- OmniPlan (unlike its brothers above)
- Scrivener
So that’s what I’ve tested. Questions I can think of are:
- Why does OmniPlan work, but OmniGraffle and OmniOutliner don’t? Do they use the OS file functions the same way? I should contact their tech support to see if they know something.
- Adobe and Microsoft use non-standard file access interfaces rather than Apple’s normal browsing interface. Does that mean they are introducing something that breaks this function? If so, is it common to the other broken apps?
- Does the fact that few seem to have encountered this problem mean that it’s a problem with my actual installation rather than a bug? Is there any way to test that or best: FIX it? I tried reinstalling Monterey from the Recovery volume. It worked for a few minutes, but the I ran Disk First Aid "just to be safe" and now it's all non-functional again.
- Is my 2017 Intel-based Macbook Pro somehow incompatible with this release of Monterey?
Ugh. I hate this. I always clone my drive before a major upgrade. Just went too fast and didn’t realize that’s what was happening. Thought I was updating Big Sur (OS 11.16.xx).
