[WinMac] Re: Finder Prefs no-no

Dan Schwartz(expresso[at]snip.net)
Thu, 18 Feb 1999 12:52:51 -0500

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Message below:

At 10:22 AM 2/18/99 -0700, Kurt replied to me:
>Dan Schwartz wrote:
>>
>> Kurt:
>>
>> Naughty, naughty! NEVER back up (or more accurately, restore)
the Finder
>> Preferences file... Any changes and all hell breaks loose. Just trash the
>> old Finder Preferences file and let the MacOS build a new one from scratch
>> each time. Even if you do succeed in restoring the Finder Preferences, you
>> *still* have to reboot since the file is always locked for exclusive use...
>>
>> Cheers!
>> Dan
>
>Thanks for the feedback Dan. The reboot point you made is absolutly correct -
>my oversite for not mentioning it. However, while I agree with you that
>letting the MacOS build a new one is the safest way (and the way I've done it
>98+% of the time), I've never had an issue restoring the Finder Prefs. In
your
>defense though, I've only done this three or so times :-). What is some of
the
>stuff you've run into by doing such?
>
>Regards,
> Kurt Witowski

Dear Kurt,

I've never restored Finder Preferences; and in general never restore
preference files of any kind unless absolutely necessary. Why is this?

1) If the machine I'm repairing is already in trouble, I do several things
simultaneously, including zapping the PRAM, deleting the Desktop files, and
trashing the Finder Preferences. I then reboot with the Extensions off and
reset the appropriate Control Panels with the applets that write the
correct bits back into the PRAM; then reboot again normally;

2) Sometimes, hardware-specific information is stored in Preferences
files... Especially Photoshop;

3) Well written applications do not self-modify their code: This way the
checksums always match up and it makes it easy to detect a corrupted &/or
infected application. Instead, the variable information is written to a
separate, "disposable" file called a Preference file. The key word here is
"disposable."

I hope this helps!

        Yours truly,
        Daniel L. Schwartz,
        Electrical Engineer.

        Dan's Macintosh Consulting
        239 Great Road
        Maple Shade, NJ 08052

609-642-7666

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