OS 10.11.4 broke all of my applications...

Hello agsin:

did you try to use a combo updater rather than the one from the app store?

joshua

Thanks Shuka,

If you've got this problem on a bog-standard iMac then we can probably rule it out.

One thing I have noticed is that my files are slowly reappearing and once they reappear they behave normally in Finder. The OS might be doing some housekeeping? I think I'll leave it overnight and see what happens.

Also I've been able to open apps by clicking on files on my desktop. all the files open in their appropriate app and then you can access the app, once open, from the dock. - if it helps.

Hello DMCS:

Sorry for the ignorance, but what is "bog-standard"? does you imac have a fusion drive? If it does it may explain the slow reapperance of the applications as the fusion drive moves the most used applications to the ssd part if the fusion disk. what do you think?

BTW, did you use the standard update or the combo one?

Joshua

Hello Joshua,

Sorry, by 'bog-standard' I meant as manufactued by Apple rather than fitted with a drive purchased and installed by the user later.

I don't know if fusion drives are the issue, mine is ssd with the same problem.

I clicked the 'install everything' button in Updates, so whichever one that is I guess.

d

I have an SSD drive too (Crucial BX200 1TB)

HEllo,

the problem does not seem to be correlated to ssds. If anything it could be related to fision drives, a combination of ssd and hard disk managed by th OS.

I am curious to know if any of you had the problem happen on an original apple fusion drive.

Thanks

Joshua

I do not have a fusion drive, just ssd

Finally I found the cure. The problem is caused by a cache folder not cleaned after installation. What a headache!

After updating to 10.11.4, you may experience all applications gone, folders missing, files missing, etc. But it just LOOK that way. All files are in fact still there.

So what I did was:

1. Use another account to login. Need admin rights. If you only have one account but experience this issue, follow this post:

http://www.cnet.com/how-to/how-to-rebuild-a-user-account-in-os-x

to create an admin account. But stop at the step where it ask you to delete the problematic user.

2. Reboot and login with your newly created account

3. Launch Terminal

4. Go to this folder: /private/var/folders

5. Identify the problematic user with this command: ls -al

You may have more than one (like me) if you have more than one user. You can go into each folder, use ls -al to look at the owners and groups to identify if that is the user that give you the headache.

6. Once you identified that user, just delete the folder held by that user.

7. Reboot, login with your problematic user and you should see everything comes back to normal.

Hope that helps.

Isn't it possible to delete the problematic files in Single-User mode instead of using it to create a new user and logging in as the new user to use the Terminal there?

Good question. Originally I was trying to verify if the same issue happened in a new user. So I go to Single user mode to create a new user to confirm my suspicion.

I did not try. But I believe you can take that short cut.

Thank you for the hint. Back to normal after deleting.

You have to login as a different user, as you cannot start Terminal otherwise

Thank you Chriskan,

This worked for me as well.

Hello:

I run the updater but after it finishes and restarts the mac the OS remains 10.11.3

I tried from the App store, I tried downloading the updater and the combo but nothing works.

Any idea?

Shuka

not hijacking - i was on this regarding your post about the applications. When i tried to install 10.11.4 again to try the solution that worked for you i encountered the problem that the installer runs but i remain with 10.11.3 after it finishes and restarts, I hoped that one of you had this problem too and could help.

thanks