Finder 'Date Modified' for folders not updating
macOS Ventura 13.7.8 Finder "Date Modified" for folders no longer reflects recent activity
I organize all of my projects as one project per folder and sort Finder by Date Modified so that the projects I've worked on most recently appear at the top.
This has worked for years, but recently stopped working.
Symptoms:
- Editing and saving existing files inside a project folder no longer updates the parent folder's Date Modified (this alone may be expected).
- However, creating a brand new file inside the folder also does not update the folder's Date Modified.
- Even manually running touch . on the folder changes the folder's filesystem modification time, but Finder only moves the folder to the top of the sorted list for about 1-2 seconds before moving it back to its previous position.
What I've verified:
- macOS Ventura 13.7.8
- APFS volume
- Projects are under ~/Documents
- Rebooting does not change the behavior.
- stat confirms that touch . updates the folder's filesystem modification time (mtime).
- Finder briefly reflects the updated time, then reverts the displayed ordering even though the filesystem timestamp has not changed.
- mdls reports kMDItemContentModificationDate and kMDItemFSContentChangeDate as the old date rather than the updated filesystem timestamp.
This makes me wonder whether Finder is sorting by Spotlight/File Provider metadata instead of the actual filesystem modification time for folders.
Has anyone else seen this? Is this an iCloud/Spotlight/File Provider issue, or is there a way to make Finder sort folders by their actual filesystem modification time again?
Thanks. This is driving me nuts because my workflow involves having the most recently used folders at the top, but folders are now frozen in time, even as I add new files to them.