My shortcuts on my desktop have disappeared and my finder will not open.

Any ideas on how to fix this? I think it happened shortly after the new security update. OS X 10.9.2

Mac mini, OS X Mavericks (10.9.2)

Posted on May 1, 2014 12:49 AM

Reply
8 replies

May 1, 2014 1:03 AM in response to warwick15

My shortcuts on my desktop have disappeared and my finder will not open.

What exactly is happening? Your Finder must be open, if you are viewing your Desktop. Is the Finder unresponsive?


"shortcuts on my desktop": Do you mean, the Desktop is empty and you do not see the alias on the Desktop? Or is the Dock missing?


Have you restarted the system?


I asked the hosts to move your question to the Mavericks forum, for more help.

May 1, 2014 10:56 AM in response to léonie

sorry (past windows user). All of the programs i have upon start up ( the programs that appear at the bottom, the DOCK, of the desktop as apps) appear to be here and are accessible. However I see my finder window but it will not let me open it to view the contents inside, like my documents, movies etc.


Ive tried restarting it several times and to my knowledge i dont believe i created a Mac OSX alisase. But im not realy sure what that even is.


also right clicking doesn't work as well.

May 1, 2014 12:41 PM in response to léonie

No not like that. It only has the contents on the bottom of the screen. I can see the "finder" in the dock at the bottom but it does not respond to clicking on it. I can not open a "finder window" to view things like my documents and movies etc. And the apps and files you have on the right of the screen in that picture, like the mp3, does not appear on my desktop anymore like it used to.

May 1, 2014 3:28 PM in response to warwick15

Launch the Console application in any of the following ways:


☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)


☞ In the Finder, select Go Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.


☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Console in the icon grid.


Step 1


Make sure the title of the Console window is All Messages. If it isn't, select All Messages from the SYSTEM LOG QUERIES menu on the left. If you don't see that menu, select

View Show Log List

from the menu bar.

Enter the name of the crashed application or process (Finder) in the Filter text field. Select the messages from the time of the last crash, if any. Copy them to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. Paste into a reply to this message by pressing command-V.

When posting a log extract, be selective. In most cases, a few dozen lines are more than enough.

Please do not indiscriminately dump thousands of lines from the log into this discussion.


Important: Some private information, such as your name, may appear in the log. Anonymize before posting.


Step 2


In the Console window, look under User Diagnostic Reports (not "Diagnostic and Usage Messages") for crash reports related to the crashed process. The report name starts with the name of the process, and ends with ".crash". Select the most recent report and post the entire contents—the text, not a screenshot. I know the report is long. Please post all of it anyway.

In the interest of privacy, I suggest that, before posting, you edit out the “Anonymous UUID,” a long string of letters, numbers, and dashes in the header of the report, if it’s present (it may not be.)

Please don’t post other kinds of diagnostic report—they're very long and rarely helpful.

This thread has been closed by the system or the community team. You may vote for any posts you find helpful, or search the Community for additional answers.

My shortcuts on my desktop have disappeared and my finder will not open.

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