i position 2 finder windows in readiness for a drag and drop. When i try the drag and drop the source window moves. Why I wonder would anyone on this planet wish for this feature? Does anyone know how to stop this opsys instigated move of finder window?
Earlier Mac models
Check trackpad pane in System Settings and turn OFF "force click and haptic feedback". I could not adjust my fingers to it when dragging files around.
How to use the Force Touch trackpad - Apple Support (PH)
Fixed. I followed the instructions provided by member 'macjack' in posting "How to reset all finder settings to default". Although it fixed the window moving problem it looks like it may be the cause of me now losing an awful lot of keychain items. Fortunately I do have a slightly out of date copy of these.
Thank you all for your replies - I hope the issue is finally resolved.
Have you restarted just before it was fixed? That could have done it.
I have noticed that the drag operation now needs the command key to toggle between 'copy' and 'move' whereas during the period that thing were working fine it was the option key to toggle this.
I have a MacBookPro retina mid 2015 running Catalina (also Monterey in other partition which has the same issue). I am now using 3 finger drag but the issue was present before this when using one finger.
All and any information would be greatly appreciated.
I checked the setting for "force click and haptic feedback" and it was already OFF. The problem seems to be cured although I do not know what, if anything, that i have done to make it change. I have changed various things in system preferences but nothing that I thought would affect this moving windows issue. I have tried temporarily turning ON the "force click and haptic feedback" setting and the windows still remained fixed as I prefer. So problem solved although I know not how. Thank you all for your replies.
I have restarted the laptop several times recently due to an update from Catalina to Monterey which went wrong. But each time I still had the window moving problem.
As a matter of interest (unrelated) I would advise against upgrade to a different part of your hardrive from where you start the upgrade. I will find a suitable place on the forum to tell that story.
Alas the problem is still present. If I drag files quickly with either 3 fingers or 1 then it is mostly fine but if i am not quick enough the source window still moves across. I have tried different pressure with the drag but this makes no difference.
No forget mention of upgrade because I abandoned Monterey and installed Catalina again from scratch to the place that it was in before (the place on the disk that the Monterey upgrade attempt wiped clear). It is a new install of Catalina but I was having the window moving problem with my previous install of Catalina.
The drag and drop can be a simple one with no key held down it still moves the source window to where the target window was before start of the drag. It seems that when I start a drag sometimes the Command key toggles the copy/move and sometimes it is the Option key.
I wonder if I am the only person in the community to be/have experiencing this annoying issue. It is not so bad if I am only using finder as I create in the source window an alias for the Target folder. When trying to drag and drop to another app it is very frustrating. Nearly as frustrating as using Ubuntu.
You don't state which version of macOS you are using or on which Mac but, that doesn't happen on any of my Macs.
I really don't know unless you are partially touching outside the icon you are trying to move. Maybe someone else will have an idea.
Then what you are trying to use is an option-drag, isn't it?
And this function was changed by a recent upgrade of your macOS, isn't it
finder source window moves during drag and drop
