how to get rid of stale lock file?

OK is it in the plist files? I had a save given to me tonight. Maybe you cannot find your library.

NOT The HD library, but the user library.

Open FInder and then go to GO in menu bar at top, and hold a click on that while also pressing option and command and then you will see a finder window open showing the library. Check preferences first...

but scour that, and when you find the one (if that is in fact IT) trash it. BUT- just in case- one trick I was told years ago in a trouble shooting I cannot even recall (circa 2004 or 5)- pull the file to desktop and then restart, and if no troubles and nothing missing (and if it works now!) then is o k to trash And delete...

PS I am needing sleep so badly I am going away now. Good luck! I hope to see an email when I come back tomorrow and read you got it fixed!

In which case just open Terminal (Applications/Utitlities/Terminal.app) and paste

mv /users/gtatcs/.jbapps-gtatcs ~/Desktop/jbapps-gtatcs

This will move the file to your Desktop. Restart and test.

If everything is OK, you can delete the file from your Desktop. If not, posts back here describing any problems and/or error messages.

Lockfiles are associated with the preferences writing routines in OS X. Hold the Option key and choose "Library" from the "Go" menu. Then go to the Preferences folder in there and you should see a number of files like "com.apple.AddressBook.plist" along with a cooresponding lockfile (ie, "com.apple.AddressBook.plist.lockfile"). This file is an empty file that is used as a checkout flag of sorts to ensure one program accesses and writes to the preferences at once. You can access the one for your program by looking it up by developer and program name (they should be in the file name), and then removing it.

See here for more info: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20093292-263/lockfiles-and-other-plist-file -subtypes-in-os-x-lion/

Run the same command but this time put the word 'sudo' first:

sudo mv /users/gtatcs/.jbapps-gtatcs ~/Desktop/jbapps-gtatcs

After pressing 'return' on your keyboard, you'll be asked to type your admin password. Do so, but note that it doesn't echo back to the screen, so type carefully. Press 'return' again and you're done! 🙂

I had the exact same problem. I used the Terminal command like above:

sudo mv /users/edylee/.jbapps-edylee ~/Desktop/jbapps-edylee

And I was able to open the application Jawbone Updater. However, now I get an error message of:

"Failed to inspect the lock file 'Users/edylee/.jbapps-edylee' (error 2: No such file or directory)"

I realize that I moved the lockfile to the Desktop, which is why the file is missing. But what can I do to make this error messgage go away? At least I'm able to open the applicaiton, but this error box is kinda annoying.

After using the instructions above (sudo mv /Users/username/.jbapps-XXXX ~/Desktop/jbapps-xxx), I got the message, "Operation not permitted"