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Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32424 01/07/15 07:18 PM
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Originally Posted By: deniro
Well, I have a couple programs that I ran to check out the prefs: Onyx and Preferential Treatment. Everything OK.

Not that they are infallible.

Nor do they even check for what you're looking for. (Damn! I've got to start bookmarking ganbustein's posts.)


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32425 01/07/15 07:53 PM
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The trouble-shooting technique of clearing an app's default settings, forcing the app to go back to its default defaults, is still available. It's just that you don't do it by moving files. Instead, use defaults delete domain_name.

If you want to save the old settings, so you can easily put them back later, save them with

defaults read domain_name >someSaveFile.plist

and put them back with

defaults write domain_name "$(cat someSaveFile.plist)"

The latter command may fail if the saved file is very big. (At about 250KB, the "$(cat ...)" argument expands to something too long for the shell to pass along.) At some point the import/export verbs were introduced to defaults to overcome this size limit. The commands become

defaults export domain_name someSaveFile.plist
defaults import domain_name someSaveFile.plist

I'm not sure when import/export were implemented. They aren't in OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, and still aren't mentioned in man defaults even on OS X 10.10 Yosemite, but show up in defaults help.

Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32428 01/07/15 10:42 PM
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Pondering alternaut's (apparently) unrelated, but similarly frustrating, issue led me to suggest moving his entire ~/Library/Application Support folder aside, i.e. to his desktop, to see what happens. Either logging out/in or restarting afterwards is necessary.

Edit: It seems like a worthwhile step, particularly since we can no longer play with plists like we used to.

Last edited by artie505; 01/07/15 10:46 PM. Reason: Better language

The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
ganbustein #32431 01/07/15 11:05 PM
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Thanks for posting the commands. (As I said, I've got to start bookmarking your posts.)

"The venerable troubleshooting technique of trashing plists" was only part of what I was thinking; what we apparently can no longer do is move half of the contents of ~/Library/Preferences, etc, etc, etc, or is there a way to do it?


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32436 01/08/15 08:59 PM
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Quote:
moving his entire ~/Library/Application Support folder aside, i.e. to his desktop, to see what happens. Either logging out/in or restarting afterwards is necessary.


I tried it, but the only thing that does is copy the Application Support folder to the desktop. I don't know why that would help. It's impossible to delete the original Application Support folder, if that's what you were thinking.

As for the other post, I assume those are Terminal commands. I haven't worked with Terminal enough to decipher that post.

Last edited by deniro; 01/08/15 08:59 PM.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32437 01/08/15 09:16 PM
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Originally Posted By: deniro
Quote:
moving his entire ~/Library/Application Support folder aside, i.e. to his desktop, to see what happens. Either logging out/in or restarting afterwards is necessary.


I tried it, but the only thing that does is copy the Application Support folder to the desktop. I don't know why that would help. It's impossible to delete the original Application Support folder, if that's what you were thinking.

As for the other post, I assume those are Terminal commands. I haven't worked with Terminal enough to decipher that post.

I think you tried to move /Library/Application Support rather than ~/Library/Application Support. They're two entirely different animals. (Note the ~, which means /Users/Your short name.)

Forget about the Terminal commands for the moment.

Last edited by artie505; 01/08/15 09:21 PM. Reason: Explain tilde

The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32438 01/08/15 10:14 PM
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Originally Posted By: artie505
"The venerable troubleshooting technique of trashing plists" was only part of what I was thinking; what we apparently can no longer do is move half of the contents of ~/Library/Preferences, etc, etc, etc, or is there a way to do it?

You actually do that? That sends shivers up my spine.

I find it odd that so many people (not necessarily you) shy away from Terminal, as "dangerous", but don't hesitate to use the GUI to make sweeping changes across their files just to see if maybe it fixes the problem. Trashing (or moving aside) large numbers of plists, massive parts of ~/Library/Application Support, telling Finder to "apply permissions recursively", all those things give me the willies. (For that matter, asking Finder to do anything regarding permissions is scary. I have no idea how Finder is going to apply any given change. Heck, Finder won't even accurately tell me what the current permissions are. It's like trying to do surgery while blindfolded and wearing mittens.)

But surely you can narrow down any given problem to much much less than half of your preference domains. A little bit of thoughtful analysis up front is surely faster and safer than blundering about.

I know where you're coming from. In the bad old days of MacOS, it was not uncommon for Conflict Catcher to find a problem in the most unlikely of places, often as an interaction between seemingly unrelated INITs. Thank goodness for OS X and memory protection. It's been at least a decade since I've confronted a problem as thorny as the ones we needed Conflict Catcher to resolve.

Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32439 01/08/15 11:09 PM
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Originally Posted By: deniro
Well, I have a couple programs that I ran to check out the prefs: Onyx and Preferential Treatment. Everything OK.

Not that they are infallible.

They are definitely NOT infallible as you suggest. Al those utilities use the same Unix command line utility and all it does is check the grammar and syntax of the file. The parameters or values may be completely trashed but you will never know it from one of those utilities. They cannot relied upon for either a pass or fail.


If we knew what it was we were doing, it wouldn't be called research, would it?

— Albert Einstein
Re: Can't mail audio files
ganbustein #32448 01/09/15 09:42 AM
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I've never had occasion to need to go the 50/50 route, but it's a venerable technique that's been suggested for years and has, on any number of occasions, uncovered pretty odd culprits.

As you say, though, things have changed, and I've seen virtually no need to suggest it in quite a while.

But we've got two threads going at the moment, this one and Safari issues continuing after migration, that have resolved into mysterious home folder issues and have presumably undergone "thoughtful analysis" by a bunch of pretty knowledgeable mods and posters, none of whom has come up with any better suggestions than "blundering about".

"Pin The Tail On The Donkey", anybody? grin

Your question about Terminal is a good one, and I think the answer is that you can screw up in Terminal in ways that you can't in the GUI; a typo in Terminal can be disastrous, but the GUI will theoretically do precisely what you ask, i.e. think you want, it to do. You can't leave out the space between rm and / in the GUI.

I was terrified of Terminal at the outset, and I mostly still stick to copy/pasting commands posted by others; even being comfortable in the man pages, I mostly don't know enough to write my own commands, and I doubt that I ever will. (I suspect that the same goes for a very significant percentage of Mac users.)

You Terminal guys are a breed unto yourselves.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32449 01/09/15 03:22 PM
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I'm not a programmer. I have no experience with Unix. The only programming experience I have had is a BASIC class in high school and, many years later, teaching myself some HTML to write a web site.

I'm not afraid of Terminal. But it's easy to screw things up if you don't know what you're doing. I suspect that describes most Mac owners.

I agree that it should be easy to find what looks like a simple problem. To some people, all problems are simple. I have a lot of experience with Macs and agree that a thoughtful analysis, which is what I've done, ought to have revealed the problem. I've picked among the files, among prefs for instance, and deleted some (eg. both Mail plists). But there's ought and there's is. I'm talking about how things are, within the limits of my troubleshooting skills. Though they are not formidable, they do exist. But they rarely include a command line.

I reinstalled the system, but the problem remains.

I deleted the entire Mail folder from my home folder library. Nope.

I can view graphics I receive via email by using Quicklook. But in the message itself, the blue lego-block, question-mark icon still appears. That's also true when I drag and drop a new picture into a new message. The problem didn't exist in the new account I created. I don't know if that means the problem is in the home folder, but there's a lot in my home folder I don't want to mess with.




Last edited by deniro; 01/09/15 03:22 PM.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32468 01/11/15 04:39 PM
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More later, but it just occurred to me to ask if you've ever looked in /Applications/Utilities/Console.app > Console Messages to see if there's anything in there that relates to your issue. (Try to attach something to an e-mail and look to see if a new message has popped up.)


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32473 01/11/15 09:31 PM
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This is a long shot and you may have done it already, but

In the home folder /Library/ preferences are two mail preferences. It might be worth taking them out and restarting the computer. If it doesn’t help, you can put them back into the folder
com.apple.mail
com.apple.mail-shared
I will let the powers that be on Fine Tuned Mac comment if it is advisable. As I said you may have already tried it

Re: Can't mail audio files
MarkG #32474 01/11/15 09:35 PM
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deniro's already tried trashing plists, but ganbustein's post #32425 above puts the big kibosh in that; he's gonna have to go into Terminal.


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32511 01/16/15 07:36 PM
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What do you think of this? I believed this occurred when I tried to drag and drop and .jpg into a new mail message. (I removed my username where needed):

1/16/15 3:15:18 PM Mail[108] *** WebKit discarding exception: <NSRangeException> *** -[NSCFArray objectAtIndex:]: index (0) beyond bounds (0)

1/16/15 3:15:29 PM Mail[108] Error writing to /Users/myusername/Library/Mail/RSS/.mboxCache.plist: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4 UserInfo=0x10b623190 "The folder “RSS” doesn’t exist." Underlying Error=(Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=2 "The operation couldn’t be completed. No such file or directory")

I'm also getting this:

1/16/15 3:11:29 PM ReportCrash[113] Saved crash report for LCCDaemon[103] version 3.5.1 (3.5.1) to /Users/myusername/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/LCCDaemon_2015-01-16-151129_Macintosh.crash

LCCDaemon is, I assume, related to the Logitech Control Center for my mouse. I've already tried uninstalling it to see if that makes a difference but it doesn't. I'm not sure why the word "crash" is used when my Mac didn't crash.

Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32514 01/16/15 07:43 PM
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Originally Posted By: deniro
What do you think of this? I believed this occurred when I tried to drag and drop and .jpg into a new mail message. (I removed my username where needed):

1/16/15 3:15:18 PM Mail[108] *** WebKit discarding exception: <NSRangeException> *** -[NSCFArray objectAtIndex:]: index (0) beyond bounds (0)

1/16/15 3:15:29 PM Mail[108] Error writing to /Users/myusername/Library/Mail/RSS/.mboxCache.plist: Error Domain=NSCocoaErrorDomain Code=4 UserInfo=0x10b623190 "The folder “RSS” doesn’t exist." Underlying Error=(Error Domain=NSPOSIXErrorDomain Code=2 "The operation couldn’t be completed. No such file or directory")

I'm also getting this:

1/16/15 3:11:29 PM ReportCrash[113] Saved crash report for LCCDaemon[103] version 3.5.1 (3.5.1) to /Users/myusername/Library/Logs/DiagnosticReports/LCCDaemon_2015-01-16-151129_Macintosh.crash

LCCDaemon is, I assume, related to the Logitech Control Center for my mouse. I've already tried uninstalling it to see if that makes a difference but it doesn't. I'm not sure why the word "crash" is used when my Mac didn't crash.


LCCDaemon is what crashed, not mail.

it sounds like the folder structure for your email is a bit messed up. I'd suggest rebuilding your mailboxes. You may end up having to delete your mail account and re-add it if things don't improve. (back up your messages before you delete anything)


I work for the Department of Redundancy Department
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32515 01/16/15 08:31 PM
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Since you've already tried rebuilding your mailboxes with no joy, I suggest that you go with V1 and delete/restore your mail account. (As he said, be sure you're backed up!)


The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32520 01/17/15 01:27 PM
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I rebuilt the mailbox in the past and it didn't work. I deleted the account and restored it, but that didn't work. At one point I searched for and deleted anything relevant with "mail" in it. I use EasyFind. Then I reinstalled the system, but the problem remains. I deleted some third-party programs thoroughly that I thought might be intruding, but that didn't help.

Last edited by deniro; 01/17/15 05:10 PM.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32521 01/17/15 05:18 PM
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Re: the above post about moving the Application Support folder. I prefer the following terminololgy. Which do you mean?

1) Hard drive/Library/Application Support
2) Hard drive/Users/myusername/Library/Application Support

Isn't this a clearer way to describe the pathway?

Last edited by deniro; 01/17/15 05:19 PM.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32522 01/17/15 06:21 PM
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A few minor problems yet to fix, but I think I solved it.

Because the problem wasn’t happening in the guest account, I compared the Preferences folder of that account with my usual admin account. Fortunately, I only had to get as far as the ByHost folder rather than the entire Preferences folder. I took a snapshot of the list of files in the guest's ByHost folder, then compared that with the plists in my admin ByHost folder. I deleted the admin plists which didn’t exist in the guest's By Host folder. Then I restarted. I open Mail, dragged a .jpg onto a new message, and mailed it.

Creating a guest account was an excellent idea. Thanks.


Hard Drive/Users/johnsmith/Library/Preferences/ByHost
Hard Drive/Users/myusername/Library Preferences/ByHost

Last edited by deniro; 01/17/15 06:23 PM.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32525 01/17/15 10:26 PM
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Nice job! Thanks for getting back to us with your solution.


Freedom is never free....thank a Service member today.
Re: Can't mail audio files
deniro #32528 01/18/15 09:14 AM
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Second MacManiac, but I wonder which plist of those you deleted was the culprit? (Edit: Admin plists?)

Assuming that it was ~/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.mail.your alpha-numeric string.plist, it's contents in my Snowy installation don't ring any bells:

Code:
<key>NotesSyncClientHasUpgradedForNoteID</key>
	<string>YES</string>
	<key>NotesSyncHaveUnsyncedChanges</key>
	<string>NO</string>

Do you remember which other plists you trashed?

Last edited by artie505; 01/18/15 09:34 AM.

The new Great Equalizer is the SEND button.

In Memory of Harv: Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. ~Voltaire
Re: Can't mail audio files
artie505 #32561 01/22/15 01:06 AM
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The posts following this have been moved to Ongoing Discussion in the Lounge as they no longer were relevant to the resolution of this issue.....this thread is closed.


Freedom is never free....thank a Service member today.
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