Archive Utility preferences: Move/Create archive into a specific folder

Question

ALFABreezE Author

Level 1

0 points

Archive Utility preferences: Move/Create archive into a specific folder

Hi there!

We have two options to reach Archive Utility's preferences:

From System / Library / CoreServices / Archive Utility.app (double click to launch it and then look for it's preferences once it's opened)
From System Preferences, clicking on the "Archives" icon.

Both seem to share the same settings, so I guess it doesn't matter where do we change them from.

This stated, I can set everything and have it working as expected when I select a file, ctrl-click (or RMB-click) and run the «Compress "<file_name_here>"» option in the Contextual Menu.

The only thing that does NOT work at all it's the only one I need, which is "Move/Create Archive into..." ("~/Desktop", in my case), when I create one.

It keeps acting like I didn't change it's default behavior, which is "Into the same directory of archived files".

Why?
Do someone in here managed to have it working?
What can I do to make it work?
Hints?
...more I forgot to ask?

- Please consider that I translated each command and options from Italian to English, so maybe some of them could not be exactly what you can actually find in an English OS.

TIA

cià

ale

MacPro 2x2.66 GHz Quad-Core-OTHER, Mac OS X (10.6.8), 8GB DDR 3

Posted on May 21, 2012 7:25 AM

Reply

Answer 1

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

May 21, 2012 1:58 PM in response to ALFABreezE

Works here. Move the com.apple.archiveutility.plist out of your user's Preferences folder to the Desktop, log out and back in, reset the option, and see if that fixes the issue. If not, create a new admin user account, log into it, and see if the problem persists.

Reply

Answer 2

ALFABreezE Author

Level 1

0 points

May 21, 2012 3:55 PM in response to baltwo

Thanks baltwo for your reply.

I had already tried to trash the com.apple.archiveutility.plist and logout and back in (even restarting), but with no luck.

On the other hand, I've just tried with a different user, and there it works.

(I always forget this option ;-)

Now... How can I check what's wrong with my user?

Is there any kind of "Console log" for Archive Utility (couldn't find a specific one, btw) ?

What's pretty strange is that, whatever the problem is, it only affects that only one option.

All the others keep working, even if I change them on the fly (no logout).

Tnx

cià

ale

Reply

Answer 3

baltwo

Level 9

62,386 points

May 21, 2012 10:20 PM in response to ALFABreezE

Difficult if that other user wasn't a new admin user. Given that it works elsewhere, it's specific to your original user. With a new user, you have a minimal list of preference files to deal with.

yYou can proceed in two ways. One is to log into your new account, make a list of the preference files (plists) located in /username/Library/Preferences/, including any in the ByHost subfolder, log back into the original account, move everything on that other account's list from the original account's Preferences folder into a newly created folder on the Desktop, log out and back in, and see if the problem goes away. If so, you can copy the ones in the Desktop folder (one at time) back into /Preferences/, restart, and see if the problem returns. If so, you've identified the corrupt/conflicting one. Continue with all of them until isolating the bad ones. That'll save you the trouble of resetting preferences.

The second way is much more detailed and I'll not burden you with the steps unless the above doesn't fix the issue.

Reply