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El Capitan Finder fails to update changes on NAS (SMB network share)

I've got a trusty QNAP TS-469 Pro that I've had through many versions of Mac OS X. It has worked reliably sharing up several SMB/CIFS shares to my 2012 Macbook Air 13" as I upgraded over time from Mountain Lion through Yosemite.


Immediately after upgrading this Macbook Air to El Capitan, I noticed that the Finder frequently fails to update the file or folder listings within folders on the QNAP's network shares if they are changed using a different computer. For instance, if I am connected to a share on the NAS, and someone else in the family puts a file up there, I can't see it, not through the Finder and not through Terminal either. We all use one of two admin-level user accounts on the NAS, so it is PROBABLY not a permissions issue--both user accounts can see and change everything on the NAS.


I have to eject the network share drive and reconnect to get the new listings and see the file.


Another example: if there is a file that I currently see and someone else deletes it, I still see the file. When I double-click on it, my Mac tells me the file no longer exists and fails to update the Finder to indicate this. (The file still remains there until I use the eject/reconnect workaround.)


This failure to update file/folder listings happens all the time and always and only with my El Capitan system. Non-El Capitan Macs (and of course non-Macs like our LINUX box and our Windows 10 PC) see the listing changes properly.


This problem exists whether or not I am logged in as me or as a guest account (on the NAS) and also happened in both cases where I did an in-place upgrade from Yosemite to El Capitan and then wiped the drive and did a clean install of El Capitan (same Macbook Air at different times--I thought wiping the drive would fix this issue I am describing). Also, the problem was present in El Capitan 10.11.0 and is still present in 10.11.1.


It is pretty annoying, but the workaround does always work.


Anybody else seeing this issue?


QNAP has not released any firmware updates that may have caused this, and I have the latest update they made (installed prior to the upgrade to El Capitan). I do not think it is a problem on their side given that other brands of NAS seem to be having trouble with El Capitan's Finder too. Apple probably changed the way Finder caches the file/folder listings.


Thanks in advance for any help you may provide!

MacBook Air, OS X El Capitan (10.11.1), null

Posted on Nov 23, 2015 11:07 PM

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16 replies

Feb 20, 2017 5:40 AM in response to dchang0

I have a similar issue since I use SMB shares on Yosemite. What every SMB share I have mounted, if the computer goes into standby during the night, the next day Finder tells me that there are 0 items in the share or any folder. And if I click my Qnap NAS in the Finder sidebar in shares, it tells me, in cannot log in. Restarting the computer was the only solution, any try to mount or access a share through Finder or Terminal resulted in a blocked system for quite a while.

Interestingly there is no issue with afp shares, means this issue is related to the implementation of SMB on OSX.


But I have just found something that might be a solution, I just have to verify that if works reproducible. I flushed the DNS caches with following two terminal commands:


sudo dscacheutil -flushcache

sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder;


... and see there, it works nicely and quick again...


Let me know if this also works for you.


BTW, before Yosemite 10.10.4 the commands are different, ask Google...

Jul 13, 2017 8:07 PM in response to dchang0

Similar Issue, The file server is SLES running CIFS, the Mac is El Capitan, v10.11.6.

All other CIFS clients see the updated files OK, but occasionally see the fault on the Mac.

Eject and remount of the volume corrects the error.... until next time.

Creating a new file is visible, changes to the existing filename what cannot be seen don't appear on the Mac. File can be seen in terminal, just not in Finder.

Nov 27, 2015 2:12 PM in response to dchang0

Update to this problem.


I've found that if the Mac goes into standby, when it is awoken, the NAS mount in the Shared section of the Finder sidebar (the name of the NAS with the eject button to the right of it) no longer works. If I click it, it says the location no longer exists, and I cannot eject it either. So the NAS mount stays there, completely unusable.


Interestingly, in this case, I CANNOT get to the mount via Terminal. It really is disconnected, even though it appears to be connected in the Finder sidebar.


Remounting the drive using Cmd-K works fine to regain access to the NAS share via both the Finder and Terminal. The sidebar mount does not get duplicated with the remount--the original non-functioning mount becomes functional.

Nov 27, 2015 3:22 PM in response to dchang0

A bit more on the problem:


I got the same "The operation can't be completed because the original item for "sharename" can't be found" as described in the post above, EXCEPT this time it was not the result of a suspend and wake.


This time, I clicked on the name of the NAS in the Finder Sidebar, and it successfully showed me the share listing available to my username (I am logged in to the NAS using a NAS user account). I double-clicked on a share that I had not directly mounted using the Cmd-K method, and I got the above error message.


Ordinarily, this works fine--once I mount one share on the NAS using Cmd-K, all the other shares on the NAS that are available to me can be double-clicked on to mount and browse them. I assume the process involves Mac OS X caching my NAS account credentials from the first Cmd-K mount, then using those same credentials to then mount the share whose folder I double-clicked on. If so, this problem may be related to how the Finder caches credentials.

Nov 28, 2015 10:20 PM in response to dchang0

Figured out a little more about the problem.


If I am looking at a NAS share folder that has an out-of-date listing, I can force a refresh of the folder's contents IF I either: delete a file in the folder or add a file to the folder.


I do not know if this works all the time. It seems like it works after some amount of time has passed. It does not seem to work right away every single time.


I have not tried renaming an existing file in the folder to see if that triggers a refresh of the folder's listing.

Jul 4, 2016 12:00 AM in response to a13xchan

Hi, I've found that the problem is caused by Finder creating the folder i.e cmd-shift-N command. If I created a folder on a network share using Mac A, Mac B will only see this folder as Untitled and keep appearing and then disappearing. Just like other users I've found the only way to make Mac B's view to update was by dropping the volume and remounting. I then tried creating folders in Terminal using the mkdir command i.e. mkdir /Volumes/myShare/123456/01. Creating folders this way works fine and both Mac A & Mac B see and can access the folders without issue. As this is the only solution I've found I wrote an Applescript to allow a user to enter the folder name and choose the location for the folder or use the frontmost window.


Hope this helps.

Thanks,

Nik

Aug 17, 2016 8:38 AM in response to dchang0

We just upgraded a machine to OS X 10.11.6 which watches folders on SMB shares. This problem still exists. Files that are added to the watched folder by other machines are not seen on the SMB share that is mounted on the OS X 10.11.6 share. I've also opened a bug report 27871333.


If anyone is aware of a fix, I'd appreciate knowing.

Aug 17, 2016 9:21 AM in response to Skibster

FYI, various reports mention issues with SMB v2?? Don't know for sure if this is the case with the Finder not keeping the directory updated, but we're going to try to mount the volumes as: cifs://path/to/server/volume. The idea here is that cifs = SMB v1 and this might help the problem in the short term.


You can get more info about the mounted share using: smbutil statshares -a or smbutil statshares -m /Volumes/sharename.

El Capitan Finder fails to update changes on NAS (SMB network share)

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