Archive Utility freezes when trying to unzip a zip file

Solution is given in the thread mentioned above.

Repairing permission is not required, just kill appleeventsd process.

Seb

Killing appleeventsd is the solution. It'll respawn the moment Archive Utility is launched so no worries.

This is certainly the reason rebooting also solves the problem but that's always an incredibly poor solution to such a problem. Unix was designed not to have to be restarted and should rarely be a solution to a problem.

Thanks Sebastien!!

The terminal command:

sudo killall -KILL appleeventsd

.. will work - for a while.

Sometimes even:

killall Finder

... will work - for a while.

But it remains an OS X bug.

That worked Sebastien, thanks!

In Terminal:

sudo killall -HUP appleeventsd

Only thing that I've found that works consistently is repairing permissions. Incidentally, there are utilities you can set & forget that will start up while we sleep and do this at set intervals.

In the meantime, I LOVE this free utility on the Apple Store that has been unpacking EVERYTHING for me on the Mac for years - The Unarchiver. Does stuffit files, .rar torrent files, .zips of course - you name it.

http://unarchiver.c3.cx/unarchiver

(and no, I do not work for them - but this app works for me)

All you need to do is go to: ~/Library/Preferences/ (⇧⌘G)

find and delete this plist: com.apple.archiveutility.plist

Restart your mac.

Try any zip, Enjoy!

Dont worry, system will generate new plist

download the free StuffitExpander.

http://www.stuffit.com/mac-expander.html

there is a bug in the ArchiveUtility

There is no need to install third-party apps

Problem solved:

delete plist, restart. New working plist will appear.

Cheers

vimpertor wrote:

Brian Brumfield wrote:

I am having the same issue. Looks like repairing permissions and restarting is the fix.

Seen here: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/4381241?start=0&tstart=0

This worked!!

Just opened Disk Utility, chose my boot disk, and then under First Aid, clicked "Repair Disk Premissions" - Reboot and works perfect.

Repaired the permissions. (even though there was nothing repaired)
Renamed ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.archiveutility.plist to FILE.EXT.bup

Once I restarted, archive.utility worked. *NOTE - a new .plist was auto-created*

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OS X 10.8.2 (12C60)

Mac mini Mid 2011

Message was edited by: StatikBit

Repairing permissions AND rebooting indeed did the trick on my new laptop.

Just repairing permissions without reboot (which I first tried) is not enough.

But just in case (as some people report), you need to do this process repeatedly, I have downloaded the free stuffit expander, which has always worked flawlessly for the last 10 years or so.

The problem keeps coming back after constant fixes - any long term fixes out there?

You can always use the command "unzip file_to_unzip.zip" in a terminal as a temporary solution.

Same problem here. Deleting the plist didn't work, but killing appleeventsd did — at least for this time.

I'd want to add that there seems to be another symptom: opening a Finder search window from a Spotlight search didn't work either until I killed/restarted the events daemon (which sounds plausible).

As killing the process is clearly a quick temporary fix for the current session, I'll see if deleting the plist and repairing permissions will help permanently. Otherwise, let's hope this gets fixed in an OS X update soon.

sk2001 wrote:

I'd want to add that there seems to be another symptom: opening a Finder search window from a Spotlight search didn't work either until I killed/restarted the events daemon (which sounds plausible).

Just wanted to add a data point that I have also experienced both the unzip hang and the inability to open Finder window from Spotlight search, simultaneously. Rebooting has been a temporary fix for me, but what I am learning from this thread is that I probably won't have to reboot if I kill the processes that have been mentioned.

I was having the same issue. Much searching on the internet I finally found a reliable "workaround". It seems to be triggered by a bug in Apple Events Daemon. Once the bug triggers opening any zip file fails. Restarting the computer always worked for me. However the actual workaround is much simpler.

Open Activity Monitor in the Applications/Utilities folder. Search for appleeventsd select the process and press the big red Quit button, when it asks you select force quit. That's it. Try to open the zip file again.

I have searched so many times so many places I lost track of the original poster of this solution.