Quit Finder menu option, but Finder restarts itself

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Level 1

25 points

Quit Finder menu option, but Finder restarts itself

I tried to add a Quit Finder menu option to the Finder by entering the following code in Terminal

defaults write com.apple.finder QuitMenuItem -bool YES

Sure enough, a Quit Finder menu item appears, and it works, but only for a brief while. After selecting Quit, the Finder and desktop items disappear, but then Finder restarts almost immediately.

There’s probably a daemon somewhere that’s restarting the Finder. How do I keep the Finder from restarting?

OS 10.9.5 Mavericks, MacBook polycarbonate, late 2009

MacBook (13-inch Late 2009), OS X Mavericks (10.9.5)

Posted on Dec 15, 2014 8:05 PM

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Answer 1

Esquared

Level 6

12,409 points

Dec 16, 2014 6:48 AM in response to SemiTech

What's it you're trying to achieve? Yes, quitting the Finder permanently. But why?

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Answer 2

SemiTech Author

Level 1

25 points

Dec 17, 2014 4:26 PM in response to Esquared

Why Quit Finder? Well. it does take some memory and CPU cycles to keep it active. When working with a couple of memory intensive applications you may want to have extra resources devoted to just those applications. The Finder is an application program, almost like any other, so you can Quit it and re-launch it (from the Dock) just like any other program. So that's my reason.

Now, the question is still unanswered: why does Finder restart itself, and how can I stop this behaviour?

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