Cursor Problem

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Cursor Problem

I just finished migrating my and my wife's accounts from our old iMac to our brand new Retina 5K, with Yosemite, of course. My account is fine but my wife's cursor has a strange problem - which MAY have been present before I migrated, I'm not sure:

After switching to her account, the cursor is the regular pointer. But, opening any program (e.g. Safari, Preferences, etc) and selecting a user input field, the cursor turns to the insert (vertical bar) cursor as expected. But it doesn't revert afterwards back to the pointer. Even closing all problems leaves the cursor as the input bar. The only way I've found to revert to the default pointer is to switch to my account and then back again.

The only distant memory I have is of her getting me to tweet the cursor size setting on the old machine (I can't remember how I did this) as she found the regular size difficult to see).

If anyone knows what's going on here I'd be very grateful for some advice!

iMac with Retina 5K display, OS X Yosemite (10.10.1)

Posted on Dec 28, 2014 5:37 AM

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Answer 1

Dec 28, 2014 10:06 AM in response to gyroman99

I get similar problems on my Retina iMac. What I find is that if I use Fast User Switching to get to my wife's account, the cursor goes odd, but more importantly to us, it is not possible to increase the cursor pointer size using the slider on the Display panel of the Accessibility options. If she is the first to login after a restart, then I have the same problem.

However, if we ensure that only one person is logged in at a time and do not use Fast User Switching, then each of us can adjust the cursor pointer size and the cursor pointer that is displayed is more correct.

I've tried a number of things, including stopping various background applications, but have not found a solution. One thing I can report is that my son, who has a non-retina 27 inch iMac, cannot recreate this problem even though he is also on 10.10.1. I am beginning to wonder if this is specific to the retina iMac.

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Answer 2

Dec 28, 2014 10:31 AM in response to gyroman99

Gyroman99,

You should try repairing Disk Permissions, Home Folder Permissions and ACLs in Recovery Mode. To do so:

Shutdown your Mac > on reboot hold down the ( Command ) and ( R ) keys.

If prompted > Select the best language suited for you and tap the Arrow in the bottom middle >

On the "OS X Utilities" Window that comes up select Disk Utility and press the Continue Button > Select the indented Hard Drive mine is Macintosh HD > If you have FileVault enabled you may have to unlock the drive, I don't so I'm not 100% sure > Click the "Repair Disk" button, wait until you see "The Volume Macintosh HD appears to be OK" It will be green > Click the "Repair Disk Permissions" button wait until you see "Permissions repair complete" > Hit the Red X top left corner to close Disk Utility. > You will see the "OS X Utilities" Window again.

Select Utilities ( Menubar ) > Terminal > In Terminal type:

resetpassword

The "Reset Password" Window will open behind Terminal > Select your Hard Drive mine is Macintosh HD > On the drop down select your User's name > Click the "Reset" button bottom right > repeat for each user.

Select  ( Menubar ) > Shutdown

Screenshots Included below to help guide. Sorry about the quality of some of the shots as I had to take the photos of my screen.

Hope that helps,

Weston

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Answer 3

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 28, 2014 12:21 PM in response to westongallagher

Weston,

Thanks so much for the comprehensive reply. I've done everything you listed and I was really hopeful but..... unfortunately the situation is exactly as before: Once you click on a text entry field, the cursor changes to an insert bar and stays such forever But only in my wife's account. Just one extra piece of information: I discovered that, even before I try a text entry, the cursor does NOT change to a re-size cursor when I hover over the edge of a window. The re-sizing still works fine (I use a three finger Trackpad gesture) but there's no cursor feedback. I'm still at a loss and I've scoured the internet, never having previously had a problem where someone else hadn't solved it first!

I'm puzzled why I can't find the process by which I re-sized my wife's cursor. I thought this might give me a clue. Is this something which has been removed from the OS in Yosemite?

Andy

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Answer 4

Dec 28, 2014 12:26 PM in response to gyroman99

Andy,

Interesting. I'll ponder on it some more. To change the size of the Cursor in Yosemite goto:

System Preferences > Accessibility > Display > Drag the Cursor Size.

Hope that helps,

Weston

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Answer 5

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 28, 2014 12:43 PM in response to westongallagher

Interesting - there's a clue there. Thanks for reminding me where to find the cursor size tweek. I went into my wife's account, the cursor changed to an insert bar as usual, then went into preferences. After I manipulated the slider - bigger then smaller - the cursor returned to a pointer for the first time! And it maintains its correct behaviour, whatever I then do with text fields. But there's still two related issues:

Bizarrely, manipulating that cursor size slider does NOT change the (now available) pointer size at all!!
And I STILL have the issue with no resize cursor appearing when I hover over the edge of a window.

So the clue is there, but I don't know what to reset to make it all come good!

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Answer 6

Dec 28, 2014 1:14 PM in response to gyroman99

Andy,

Try removing the following file from the preferences folder of your wife's account, rebooting, then reseting the curser size to see if it takes. You can either move the file temporary to the Desktop and then move it back if it doesn't fix anything or you can delete it in its entirety. Don't worry on reboot the system will generate a new file to store the settings in.

Macintosh HD > Users > Your Wife's User ( Example westongallagher ) > Library ( Hidden Folder ) > Preferences > com.apple.universalaccess.plist

** Tip ** Library is a hidden folder, to quickly get into it hold down the ( Option ) key and select Go > Library from the Menubar of Finder.

Hope that helps,

Weston

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Answer 7

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 28, 2014 2:36 PM in response to westongallagher

Weston,

Brilliant! That solved PART the problem. I now have a cursor in my wife's account which changes as expected between insert, re-size and pointer! I'm very grateful with where we've got to so far. So clearly the regeneration of that particular plist file did something good. But I think there must be another file, or another setting, that needs attention:

What I can now see, by comparison with my own account, is that her cursor size only grows to about a fifth of the maximum cursor size (over the full span of the slider control) that I can see in my own settings. Further, it is only when the point is set to its normal default size that its states seem to normal as described above. When the pointer is resizes by any amount at all (a change which is barely visible) the resize cursor no longer shows when you hover over a window edge.

I really appreciate your time and effort on this and I'm wondering if there is a sledgehammer we can throw at this - which would reset ALL possibly relevant settings files? I'm not a Mac inner workings expert but I do have a logical mind and I'd love to crack this last issue.

(But take your time - it's bedtime over this side of the Atlantic!!) Goodnight and thank you!

Andy

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Answer 8

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 29, 2014 12:32 AM in response to westongallagher

OK. We're there. This morning I tried the usual SMC reset and PRAM reset (the sledgehammer because I don't really know which or why one should help) and the result is that I now have a fully re-sizeable cursor/pointer doing everything that it should.

Weston - many thanks for your help!

Andy

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Answer 9

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 29, 2014 12:37 AM in response to westongallagher

Hm - spoke too soon. I referred back to JPinCheshire's post above and realised that it all came good for my wife's account this time because I logged into her's first after re-booting. When I logged into my account afterwards, I had all of her problems as previously described - can't adjust cursor size fully and no-resize cursor when the cursor size is anything but default.

So, again, this may be a clue but I'm lost as to how to solve things fully.....

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Answer 10

Dec 29, 2014 8:07 PM in response to gyroman99

Andy,

Ok, Lets see. Forgive me, I just want to recap. Is the only issue currently that when you login as one user the other user can't adjust the size of their cursor? The issue of the cursor changing to the text insert crosshair and not changing back, isn't happening anymore? and are you able to get the resize windows double arrow cursor, now?

Only reason I ask is I came across and article on the internet that suggested a few plists to delete that are related to strange cursor behavior.

com.apple.systemuiserver.plist

com.apple.preference.desktopscreeneffect.plist

com.apple.HIToolbox.plist

com.apple.BezelServices.plist

Supporting Article,

http://macosx.com/threads/weird-cursor-behavior.322060/

This of course leads me to my next question for you. You said that you migrated Your Wife and Your's accounts correct? If you create another user, even if just temporary, do you experience the weird no resize of second users cursor thing?

Look forward to your reply,

Weston

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Answer 11

Dec 30, 2014 2:32 AM in response to westongallagher

westongallagher wrote:

Ok, Lets see. Forgive me, I just want to recap. Is the only issue currently that when you login as one user the other user can't adjust the size of their cursor? The issue of the cursor changing to the text insert crosshair and not changing back, isn't happening anymore? and are you able to get the resize windows double arrow cursor, now?

This of course leads me to my next question for you. You said that you migrated Your Wife and Your's accounts correct? If you create another user, even if just temporary, do you experience the weird no resize of second users cursor thing?

Look forward to your reply,

Weston

Let me answer your questions based on my experience:

No, the cursor size is not the only issue - when using Fast Cursor Switching, the second user to log in also suffers from the "incorrect cursor icon" problem - and this continues to be the case even if the first user logs out.

If one creates a new user account, then they also suffer from this problem if they sign in using Fast User Switching.

If there is no use of Fast User Switching (following a restart), then these problems do not occur. So this suggests that the basic problem is something wrong with Fast User Switching.

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Answer 12

gyroman99 Author

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Dec 30, 2014 9:44 AM in response to westongallagher

Weston,

I agree with JPinCheshire's answer. We now seem to have exactly the same problem. You did help me solve the problem where my wife's cursor got 'stuck' as an insert bar - that is no longer happening. But I have also confirmed that it is not actual my wife's account that is the problem - the problem is linked to the second user to log in. I tested this after reading JPin's experiences. So, unfortunately, I don't think there is any point in resetting plist files within my wife's account, since it is clear that the problem is at a higher level than that. And JPin has already tested with a third user. It does sound likes it's related to user switching.

I don't know where to go next. I see the problem has now been reported to Apple, though I doubt it is their most important issue. At least (I think) we know understand the scope of the problem. If you have the interest, and thoughts which might tackle it, I"m very happy to do the experiments. I would like to get it sorted! Thanks again.

Andy

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Answer 13

Apr 12, 2015 1:49 PM in response to gyroman99

This problem of the incorrect cursor size and behaviour for the second user to sign in when using Fast User Switching is resolved in 10.10.3.

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