Bug: Tiny Finder window won't go away

Go to Finder and select your user/home folder. With that Finder window as the front window, either select Finder/View/Show View options or go command - J. When the View options opens, check ’Show Library Folder’. That should make your user library folder visible in your user/home folder. Select Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist. Move the .plist to your desktop.

Restart and test. If it works okay, delete the plist from the desktop.

If the same, return the .plist to where you got it from, overwriting the newer ones.

Thanks to leonie for some information contained in this.

You might need to redo the View settings after an update.

Send Apple feedback. They won't answer, but at least will know there is a problem. If enough people send feedback, it may get the problem solved sooner.

Feedback

This isn't a bug with Finder in Yosemite and does not occur on a fresh un-touched installation.

As far as I understand, it's a flag that has been inserted into the core settings of Finder, by another application that was installed.

This code is inserted by certain applications (like TotalFinder or ExtraFinder and others) that caused Finder to not repaint after dragging the window tab.

To repair Finder, do the following:

1. open /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app (a command prompt should appear)
2. copy and paste the following (it is one long single line):
   

   
   osascript -e "tell application \"Finder\" to quit" && defaults write com.apple.finder DisableAllAnimations -bool false &&  defaults write com.apple.finder AnimateWindowZoom -bool true && defaults write com.apple.finder TotalFinderDontFixInstallerDefaults -bool true
   

3. hit ENTER

That should fix it. You may have to load up Finder (if it doesn't automatically start back up). Or further simply restart your computer.

I've got this problem too. Yes, force quitting the finder gets rid of them but they just come back. I've restarted my Mac a lot of times now and they keep coming back. This is definitely a bug that needs squashed.

Same issue here on a Macbook Pro Retina (2012). Finder now has tabs in Mavericks and this issue happens when you pull out a Finder tab. The moment you're moving that finder tab, it's drawn as a mini-me of the Finder window. It seems the ghost of the mini-me remains even when the mini-me grows up.

Relaunching (alt-right clicking the finder icon) helps.

I'm sorry but this is NOT a solution to fix the problem. This is a workaround to patch a yet PERSISTENT bug.

I do not have these offending applications: TotalFinder or XtraFinder on my computer yet I am still getting it.

Apple! Fix your **** Finder application already. It does not:

- sort or arrange folder properly (I am constantly having to select any sorting arrangement for it to trigger the sorting/arrangeing feature, then it does what its supposed to)

- size columns properly

- consistently keep icon previews properly

This has been going on for YEARS. Please, someone ask me to compile the research that validates this.

The advice on this page helped me, but there was a step missing.

Click anywhere on Desktop.

On the Menu bar select Go then hold alt key and click Library.

Double-click Preferences and delete "com.apple.finder.plist"

Back to Library then double-click SyncedPreferences and delete "com.apple.finder.plist"

Reboot

After you complete this you will have to re-set your Finder preferences as you had them before.

Thanks to Eric for helping me resolve this problem.

Confirmed, this is caused by any app tweaking Finder's AnimateWindowZoom and DisableAllAnimations plist keys (TotalFinder does that).

To fix it for plain Finder, please execute this as a single line in Terminal.app:

osascript -e "tell application \"Finder\" to quit" && defaults write com.apple.finder DisableAllAnimations -bool false && defaults write com.apple.finder AnimateWindowZoom -bool true

To fix it for TotalFinder please follow this post:

http://discuss.binaryage.com/t/weird-finder-ghosting/1526/2

I'm sorry for this glitch.

Confirmed that this worked.

Interestingly I had uninstalled TotalFinder many months before I ever upgraded to Mavericks but somehow it didn't help. As part of a documented and public API, I'd still put this issue in Apple's court. Perhaps you should also report this to the Apple team? (I don't know how it's done)

I'm trying to set the values back to defaults in my uninstall script:

https://github.com/binaryage/totalfinder-i18n/blob/master/uninstaller/uninstall. applescript#L89-L94

Unfortunately it probably failed in your case for some reason.

In general setting plist tweaks while app is running is not 100% safe, Finder/TotalFinder could override the values again during normal operation or during shutdown sequence.

I should double-check it.

Another way to prevent this is to not drag the tab to make it a stand alone window. Right click (control-click) on the tab and choose "Move Tab to New Window" The mini window won't appear. It's only when dragging the tab. Definite bug and maybe they'll fix it in Yosemeti. Obviously not a high priority for them.

I had this! I just relaunched finder and it went away. Hold down alt and right click on the finder icon if you don't know how to relaunch.

For me, it happens when I drag a tab out of a Finder window to create a separate window.

Yes, you're right, I can replicate the problem again like this. Agree it's a bug.

Thanks Eric and Leonie ! This solution works for me too 🙂

No more ghost finder window images on my desktop !!!

I really love this "Apple Support Communities" 😎

Torp