In an earlier discussion the responder repeated insisted that this was the way to fix the problem of recent files not showing in finder. However he never bothered to say how to do that and it doesn't show up readily in a search of the apple support site.
Maybe a more complete and useful response anyone?
iMac 21.5″, macOS 11.6
Press the Control and Option keys, click on its Dock icon, and choose Relaunch. Alternatively, click on Force Quit in the Apple menu.
(214073)
Press the Control and Option keys, click on its Dock icon, and choose Relaunch. Alternatively, click on Force Quit in the Apple menu.
(214073)
Under the Apple Menu, select Force Quit. In the Force Quit window that opens, select Finder and click the Relaunch button. (see Niel's earlier response, he also suggested this)
Well that didn't work as described. After pressing the control and option keys it simply closed all active apps, clicking the finder icon in the dock produced no options. The only operable option was to restart, which did restore display of recent files. So all open work was lost. It would have just been easier to say to do a restart.
force relaunch of finder
