Apple TV can't load iTunes library that has gone to sleep

Also how do you reload it, because I found a typo in the plist file so it probably didn't load the SH file properly, oh this MAC is confusing stuff.

In console, make sure you click the Show Log List icon to show all the log files. Then make sure you have "All Messages" selected under System Log Queries. That should show you all the system logs. Then look for entries prefixed with "iTunesFix:".

Another way to see if it worked is to stop the script by executing the following commands

cd ~/Library/LaunchAgents

launchctl unload com.corknation.fixhomesharing.plist

Then quit iTunes. Then launch the agent again and since iTunes was closed, it should launch iTunes (but it will launch minimized so just make sure that you can tell by the icon on the Dock that it's running).

cd ~/Library/LaunchAgents

launchctl load com.corknation.fixhomesharing.plist

If you watch the console, every hour you should see a new entry prefixed with "iTunesFix:". That's how you know its running every hour.

Ok it's not opening:

Aug 13 20:32:26 MAC-G5 iTunesFix[365]: iTunes is not running. Launching iTunes

Aug 13 20:32:26 MAC-G5 com.corknation.fixhomesharing[360]: open: invalid option -- j

Maybe the "open" command in 10.5.8 doesn't support -j. Try this. From the terminal, type open and hit return. You should get a listing of the options open supports. Mine from 10.8 looks like this

office-imac:~ rob$ open

Usage: open [-e] [-t] [-f] [-W] [-R] [-n] [-g] [-h] [-b <bundle identifier>] [-a <application>] [filenames] [--args arguments]

Help: Open opens files from a shell.

By default, opens each file using the default application for that file.

If the file is in the form of a URL, the file will be opened as a URL.

Options:

-a Opens with the specified application.

-b Opens with the specified application bundle identifier.

-e Opens with TextEdit.

-t Opens with default text editor.

-f Reads input from standard input and opens with TextEdit.

-F --fresh Launches the app fresh, that is, without restoring windows. Saved persistent state is lost, excluding Untitled documents.

-R, --reveal Selects in the Finder instead of opening.

-W, --wait-apps Blocks until the used applications are closed (even if they were already running).

--args All remaining arguments are passed in argv to the application's main() function instead of opened.

-n, --new Open a new instance of the application even if one is already running.

-j, --hide Launches the app hidden.

-g, --background Does not bring the application to the foreground.

-h, --header Searches header file locations for headers matching the given filenames, and opens them.

If your output doesn't have -j, then you will need to modify the fixhomesharing.sh file to change "open -j -a iTunes" to "open -a iTunes". There are 5 places you'll need to change it. Then just save the file. Now unload and load the plist and it should work (hopefully).

I wrote this on 10.8 so i can't test it on 10.5. Let me know how it goes.

it seems maybe it doesn't like the -j option/switch?

Ok yep, that's what I was on to, when I do that, I don't have -J as an option.

Bingo, works! Thank you so much! I've learned a lot about this Mac stuff too lol. So, if I have to reboot the MAC, which hardly ever happens, will it automatically load that script or do I have to do the launchctl again from terminal.

I dont know if whatever I put in the "LaunchAgents" folder that I made since one didn't exist will automagically reload on reboot.

The script will launch whenever you log into that account (which is necessary to have iTunes running). You don't need to do anything more at this point. I would say to watch the Console logs for the next few days just to make sure you see entries each hour and whether it restarted iTunes or not.

I'm probably going to modify the script over the next few days to add in logic to check whether iTunes is playing media locally and not restart if it is. That way if i'm listening to music on the computer it doesn't restart it in the middle.

Ok thanks will do. I have console minimized so I'll check it out. That is the only account on the computer and it is set to auto login.

Okay, so I loaded the script and things seemed to be working fine for the last two days. Just got home now and tried to watch a movie and I got the dreaded 'Loading Library' again.

Checked the console and it ran the script only 20 minutes ago.

16/08/12 5:43:48.468 PM iTunesFix[2332]: iTunes is already running. Check if it's preventing sleep

16/08/12 5:43:48.513 PM iTunesFix[2343]: iTunes is currently preventing sleep (streaming?). Do nothing

Not sure what happened??

So far I'm still running strong! 4 days and going, hasn't gone this long since I first bought my ATV2's way back when! Many thanks!

I have been using your script and Lingon since Mid August. Everything was working fine until recently. Now, every hour even when streaming from iTunes. iTunes quits and relaunches, which of course causes your movie on Apple TV to stop. I really thought your fix had put an end to the AppleTV/iTunes troubles. Any ideas?

Thank you...

I have the same issue now, its on the hour. How do I disable the script from running. This started happening when I did the latest software update which I believe fixes the issue so we shouldn't need the script anymore.

You can use Lingon to delete the job or a few commands in Terminal. I think it's pretty self explanatory if you use Lingon. If you want to use the command line, launch Terminal and type the following commands, hitting return after each one:

cd ~/Library/LaunchAgents/

launchctl unload com.corknation.fixhomesharing.plist

rm com.corknation.fixhomesharing.plist

Thank you. I had tried Lingon but for some reason it wasn't working, I think since my version of MacOS is old or something. I used your command line way and it has removed it. Now to see if the problem has been fixed. Thanks again!