All of my icons have dissappeared from dock and all system icons are gone.

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Level 1

8 points

All of my icons have dissappeared from dock and all system icons are gone.

After I installed Yosemite 10.10.2 from scratch and installed an admin user and started configuring, my main user logon went funky. All icons on the dock disappeared, and when I open a Finder window, all icons are gone everywhere.

I have a Mac Pro (Mid 2012) 3.2 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon with 20GB RAM

I have already already tried restarting PRAM, repairing permissions, unlocking and restarting dock, deleting dock prefs, deleting finder prefs, creating a new user and switching over to that one. Note: The administrator logon does not have this problem, nor another user logon that was installed before this problem appeared. Pretty much only other software installed is Adobe Creative Cloud, but was not day coincident with that install.

I checked the console and get the following error:

3/30/15 9:36:40.764 AM NotificationCenter[276]: Error returned from iconservicesagent: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4097 "Couldn’t communicate with a helper application." (connection to service named com.apple.iconservices) UserInfo=0x618000663c80 {NSDebugDescription=connection to service named com.apple.iconservices}

Any ideas?

Mac Pro, OS X Yosemite (10.10.2)

Posted on Mar 30, 2015 10:03 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 10:24 AM in response to mhechtman

Back up all data before continuing.

Please triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

mv $TMPDIR../C/*.ic*s .Trash/

Copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C.

Launch the built-in Terminal 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 and start typing the name.

Paste into the Terminal window by pressing the key combination command-V. I've tested these instructions only with the Safari web browser. If you use another browser, you may have to press the return key after pasting.

Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear below what you entered. You can then quit Terminal. Log out or restart the computer. Test.

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Answer 2

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 10:33 AM in response to Linc Davis

I executed it, but no change. Still missing all icons in dock/finder/sidebar

Note: During one of the handlings earlier, the calendar app icon showed up on my bar, and the finder icon has always been there, but none other.

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Answer 3

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 10:44 AM in response to mhechtman

Back up all data before proceeding.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it:

/Library/Caches/com.apple.iconservices.store

Right-click or control-click the highlighted line and select

Services ▹ Reveal in Finder (or just Reveal)

from the contextual menu.* A folder should open with an item selected. Move the selected item to the Trash. You may be prompted for your administrator login password. Restart the computer and empty the Trash.

*If you don't see the contextual menu item, copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C. In the Finder, select

Go ▹ Go to Folder...

from the menu bar and paste into the box that opens by pressing command-V. You won't see what you pasted because a line break is included. Press return.

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Answer 4

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 11:56 AM in response to Linc Davis

Thank you for taking this up Linc,

I was being told I didn't have permissions on the com.apple.iconservices.store. But I opened "info" and opened permissions to admin and everyone, and was then able to get inside the folder.

Now in this folder I see many ".isdata" items, and a plist. Should I delete everything in the folder? or just the plist?

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Answer 5

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 12:13 PM in response to mhechtman

Just drag the folder to the Trash, as I wrote earlier. There's no need to change the permissions.

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Answer 6

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 12:18 PM in response to Linc Davis

I deleted the .store, emptied trash and restarted, but no difference.

The only change I notice is that before I had around 10 errors on the console at a crack, but now its about 100. Yikes.

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Answer 7

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 12:45 PM in response to mhechtman

Problems such as yours are sometimes caused by files that should belong to you but are locked or have wrong permissions. This procedure will check for such files. It makes no changes and therefore is not, in itself, a solution.

First, empty the Trash, if possible.

Triple-click anywhere in the line below on this page to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard by pressing the key combination command-C:

find ~ $TMPDIR.. $ -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 $ 2>&- | wc -l | pbcopy

Launch the built-in Terminal 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 and start typing the name.

Paste into the Terminal window by pressing command-V. The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run.

Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign ($) to appear.

The output of the command will be a number. It's automatically copied to the Clipboard. Please paste it into a reply.

The Terminal window doesn't show the output. Please don't copy anything from there.

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Answer 8

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 1:21 PM in response to Linc Davis

I got the following:

32

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Answer 9

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 1:23 PM in response to mhechtman

Although the problem is different, please back up all data and then follow the instructions in this support article.

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Answer 10

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 2:26 PM in response to mhechtman

Unfortunately, no go.

It did run lsregister on several plugins, and I restarted, and nothing changed.

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Answer 11

pmiles

Level 6

16,013 points

Mar 30, 2015 2:29 PM in response to mhechtman

Worth a try:

http://furbo.org/2015/01/19/clearing-the-icon-services-cache-in-yosemite/

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Answer 12

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 3:10 PM in response to pmiles

Thank you pmiles.

Worth a try, but didn't work.

Whatever is wrong in my plists and caches must be tied to the username (not full name), as when I create a new user by a different name, the problem doesn't come up. But if a delete the trouble user account, and create a new user by the same username, the problem repeats.

It will be good to know what causes this, as I am IT over several Macs, and if this comes up on their Macs, it won't be so easy to just create a new user and delete the old, as I would be forced to give them a new Active Directory username. Yikes.

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Answer 13

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 3:30 PM in response to mhechtman

Please read this whole message before doing anything.

This procedure is a diagnostic test. It’s unlikely to solve your problem. Don’t be disappointed when you find that nothing has changed after you complete it.

The purpose of the test is to determine whether the problem is caused by third-party software that loads automatically at startup or login, by a peripheral device, by a font conflict, or by corruption of the file system or of certain system caches.

Disconnect all wired peripherals except those needed for the test, and remove all aftermarket expansion cards, if applicable. Start up in safe mode and log in to the account with the problem. You must hold down the shift key twice: once when you turn on the computer, and again when you log in.

Note: If FileVault is enabled in OS X 10.9 or earlier, or if a firmware password is set, or if the startup volume is a software RAID, you can’t do this. Ask for further instructions.

Safe mode is much slower to start up and run than normal, with limited graphics performance, and some things won’t work at all, including sound output and Wi-Fi on certain models. The next normal startup may also be somewhat slow.

The login screen appears even if you usually login automatically. You must know your login password in order to log in. If you’ve forgotten the password, you will need to reset it before you begin.

Test while in safe mode. Same problem?

After testing, restart as usual (not in safe mode) and verify that you still have the problem. Post the results of the test.

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Answer 14

mhechtman Author

Level 1

8 points

Mar 30, 2015 3:48 PM in response to Linc Davis

Thank you for taking the time on this.

I went into safe mode (holding shift twice). I don't have any additional third party devices, just full apple keyboard (not wireless) and wireless magic mouse.

The only change I noticed is (as you said) screen resolution was lower, and before login screen, a strange flickering and slow redraw of screen, filling in horizontal bars at random. And the same after logging in, strange flicker and redraw.

Otherwise, same missing icon problem.

Then I returned to normal login and saw the same icon problem.

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Answer 15

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,547 points

Mar 30, 2015 5:35 PM in response to mhechtman

When you deleted the account, did you also delete the home folder and recreate the account with an empty home folder?

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