Slow file open dialogue box

Just checking to see if we're discussing the same thing. By "slow-finder-open" bug, are you referring to the Mavericks issue of how silly long it took for your drives and folders took to appear in a dialogue box such as this?:

Or do you mean when double clicking a folder on the desktop, that it opens in a very choppy animated movement?

If this is affecting more than just one or two people, then it's best to start to file feedback at this address:

http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html

I imagine the more reports that come through the 'official' door about the same issue, the more it is pushed up the stack, so it's probably the best way to get it noticed. I've logged it once, but be good if you all did the same.

Same issue here. Another thread ( here ) suggested a possible fix by toggling the Show scroll bars option ( System Preferences===>General pane ) between "always" and "when scrolling" but most folks said it didn't help ( but one did ). I've posted a feedback note to Apple but wondering if anyone has posted a bugreport ( rdar ). btw/fwiw: this is on a: 27-inch iMac 3.4 GHz Core i7 quad-core with 16 GB Ram.

gs_mac wrote:

Just adding a "me too".

Thanks gs_mac.

I would also encourage all the "me too"s out there to REPORT THIS TO APPLE. More reporters means higher priority.

The Apple Feedback link is here

Apple BugReporter is here.

brilor wrote:

I would also encourage all the "me too"s out there to REPORT THIS TO APPLE. More reporters means higher priority.

The Apple Feedback link is here

Apple BugReporter is here.

btw: Please file Apple Feedback. Apple is NOT watching these posts, so the "me too" posts do NOT inform Apple. I'm sure Apple's developers can barely keep up with reported bugs.

Snaggletooth_DE wrote:

Working workaround:

Use the following statements in Terminal.

sudo vi /etc/auto_master

In this file comment out /net with # (#/net .....)

sudo automount -vc

Fixed.

Confirmed here too both for Preview.app Open file sluggishness and Finder window population. Thanks Snaggletooh_DE!

Couple of notes:

(1) Some folks may be more comfortable using a GUI editor like TextWrangler instead of vi

a) in the Finder use the GO menu and select Go to Folder

b) type '/etc' ( without single quotes ) in the Go to folder dialog box and press the Go button

c) Right ( Control ) click the auto_master file in the resulting Finder window. Select "Open with...." and use TextWrangler ( your choice )

d) Comment out the line by inserting a '#' ( pound sign ) as noted in Snaggletooth_DE's instructions

e) Save the file ( probably need to authenticate with your admin password )

f) Do the 'sudo automount -vc' per Snaggletooth_DE's instructions. Will need to authenticate again.

(2) Notice Snaggletooth_DE described this as a "workaround" because it bypasses an Apple bug. Presumably most people have not changed their auto_master file and it worked fine in Mountain Lion and prior. In other words: If you haven't done so already, please continue to submit feedback and bug reportsto Apple for this issue

Kudos to Snaggletooth_DE for figuring out code is trying to look at network ( NFS ) volumes that maybe don't exist.

superjones wrote:

This bug was like some sort of Chinese water torture.

...had decided to give up and hope, wish, wait for Apple to release a fix in a one-off.

I can't say too much due to NDAs, but would encourage everyone to file Apple feedback and bug reportsto get a permanent fix. Remember: this is just workaround.

Honestly, I'm shocked as well that Apple hasn't addressed this critical issue yet! Guess now we know why Mavericks was offered for free! 😟

Jan 3, 2014 12:09 PM (in response to Eric Hildum)

Eric Hildum wrote:

Then please reproduce the problem, collect the sysdiagnostics report, and submit the bug report to Apple

brilor, has already told Eric he's submitted this info almost 2 months ago, and still no solution or even acknowledgement from Apple of the problem! Others have also submitted reports to Apple! Time to come out of denial Apple, and once and for all fix this issue!

AJDesignCo suggested renaming /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/preferences.plist to force a rebuild of the file.

and wrote also:

Let me know if this worked for you.

Thanks for the post. The only solution that has worked here( i.e. on my machine ) is the edit of /private/etc/auto_master as suggested by Snaggletooth_DE.

To try AJDesignCo's suggestion:

I backed out Snaggletooths_DE's suggestion and renamed per AJDesignCo's suggestion; it was not a solution here. My test is to simply open the Preview.app and use the File==>Open... menu. The dialog clocks ( spinning gear icon in lower left of dialog window ) and doesn't populate the files as per the original issue.

Please note the related discussion which is also solved by Snaggletooth_DE's workaround here

Please send feedback and bug reportsto Apple because they do NOT monitor these lists for bugs and we need them to fix it. Thank you.

These work arounds aren't working for me, can I suggest those that are unhappy report the problem and lets get apple to help fix this, I've wasted days on various Craperick problems.

http://www.apple.com/feedback/macosx.html

You may need to manually mount something... Full details of what's involved, what the file is meant to be used for, and related man pages:

https://developer.apple.com/library/mac/documentation/Darwin/Reference/Manpages/ man5/auto_master.5.html

I have never used automount for networked drives since my backups are local and I only access my NAS when I need to and just wait the few seconds it takes to connect when doing so. Nothing negative unless you cannot spare a few seconds to do what was once automated. You can follow my instructions earlier in this thread to make sure you have a backup in place (invoke cp to create an easy backup before editing) before making the edit using nano so that a quick reworking of files will get you right back to where you started if for some reason there would be problems.

As has also been mentioned by many, undo this change before applying an update from Apple that may fix the problem and make this workaround irrelevant (10.10.x maybe???) and be sure to take your place in the bug reporting parade.

Here is what I suggest:

1. Open Terminal and invoke: cd /etc
2. To make sure you have a backup of an assumed known-good file, invoke: sudo cp auto_master auto_master.backup (Enter your admin password when prompted.)

   You can confirm that both files exist by invoking: ls auto_master*. The "cp" command just copies one file to another, so this step is duplicating the existing auto_master file.

3. Now that you are already in /etc, simply invoke: sudo nano auto_master
4. Use your arrow keys to place the cursor in front of the line beginning with "/net" and then type "#" (without the quotes).
5. Press Control-O (Control -- not Command -- and the "Oh" keys at the same time) and then press Enter/Return to confirm and write out to auto_master.
6. Control-X to to exit nano.
7. From Terminal you can confirm the change by invoking: more auto_master (You can "more auto_master.backup" to see what the file used to look like - the only difference should be that the /net entry is commented out with the #.)
8. Invoke: sudo automount -vc

You're done. Exit the Terminal and you should be good to go. This workaround works for me. If Apple releases a fix in a future update for 10.9, be sure to revert the change before applying the proper fix from Apple.

Update: Using GUI file editors is easy, but so is using an editor like nano (beats vi when the option exists). I am not contradicting Brilor's instructions, but providing as detailed a description as possible to work with CLI tools as I think if one is going to implement a workaround like this then one should feel comfortable with the command line and its tools.

Yep, I am also seeing this‚ in many apps. At first I thought it was just because of the external drives spinning up, but that doesn't seem to be the case. It often takes as long as ten seconds, too. The pinwheel in the bottom left of the dialogue box will go to town and I can click through folders, but no contents will list and default directory icons will stay blank until it's done "loading".

It also seems that each app I'm using has to go through the process—so it's not like it goes through it once and it's "fired up" so to speak. So it's a little frustrating going back and forth between Photoshop and Illustrator. WIsh I knew how to narrow down exactly what it is!

I'm on a late 2011 21.5" iMac.

Hi Dave,

I just wanted to chip in and say I'm seeing the same issue too over the last week since upgrading. Filesharing on or off.

I get between a 10-20 second delay in file open or save dialog boxes across a range of programs but it's not consistent and I can't seem to pin down what triggers it yet.

I saw someone else with the same issue here:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=1656123

I've just trashed the finder preferences (com.apple.finder.plist) and relaunching Finder and will see if this helps and report back.

EDIT - ok, no it didn't! As soon as I went to Safari, it spun for 12 seconds. Went to Mail and tried an attachment and got the same thing.

On a MacBookAir 13" 2012 model that's blazingly fast, so it's not for horse power or down to disk access.