Finder Issues.... What's Going On!!

[jabhome]

Sorry for the repost, but I really need some help with this issue. I had added a few items that seem related for clarification.

1. My desktop consists of a blue screen, i.e. the blue screen that appears while booting. When the login window appears, I have the login box overtop the Aqua.jpg. When I enter my user/password the desktop reverts to the blue screen. If I open up the Desktop Picture control panel in system preferences, it shows Abstract 8 as the chosen background, however, the desktop is still "BLUE." If I change from Abstract 8 to another .jpg, you guessed, the desktop is still blue.

2. When I open Finder Preferences the checked box for show HD on desktop is checked, guess what they are not there.

3. Each application on my system has its own set of menus (the stuff up top next to the apple, what is that called). If you have mail and IE open, and Mail is in front, you simply click anywhere within an open IE window underneath mail, and the bar switches from Mail to IE. This also applies to the Finder, if you click on the desktop, the Finder's respective menus should appear next to the apple. This is not the case on my system, swtiching between apps on my iBook is fine, but when I click on the desktop the iBook beeps, and the menu stays with the current application. The only way to switch to the Finder menus is to click on the Finder Dockling. This sucks because when you do that it opens a new Finder Window, which is not my intent, I merely want the menu.

4. I open a Finder Window, create a new folder within my home directory (untitled folder), click the folder, drag it to the desktop, drop on desktop, and the folder mysteriously floats back into my home directory. No error appears stating this folder can't be moved, I can move it anywhere else within the system, even the trash. I just can't move it to the desktop.

I HAVE NO FRIGGIN DESKTOP!!!!

What did I do?

Everything was perfect until I restarted as described in my initial post.

Please help,
Jason

P.S. I am not complaing about 10.1, I love it, I think I screwed something up, and want your help.

[Tom C]

(1) Clicking on the Finder icon in the Dock does NOT open a new Finder window, unless the Finder was already the active app. This was true in 10.0.4 and still is true in 10.1.

(2) In 10.0.4, clicking on the desktop made the Finder the active app and brought all Finder windows to the front. In 10.1, clicking on the desktop still makes the Finder the active app, but does NOT bring all open Finder windows to the front. You can bring a Finder window to the front by selecting it from the "Window" menu on the menu bar.

[jabhome]

Originally posted by Tom C
(1) Clicking on the Finder icon in the Dock does NOT open a new Finder window, unless the Finder was already the active app. This was true in 10.0.4 and still is true in 10.1.

(2) In 10.0.4, clicking on the desktop made the Finder the active app and brought all Finder windows to the front. In 10.1, clicking on the desktop still makes the Finder the active app, but does NOT bring all open Finder windows to the front. You can bring a Finder window to the front by selecting it from the "Window" menu on the menu bar.

1) When I click on the Finder icon in the dock it immediately opens a finder window regardless if another application is the active app. In 10.0.4 if I had a finder window already open, and I hit the dockling again, it would open a second finder window. This does not seem to be the case in 10.1, once a finder window is open, clicking on the dockling has no effect, except to bring forward the finder menus. That is to bad, because I liked clicking the dockling twice to open multiple windows for drag/drop.

2) You are correct about the desktop clicking, however clicking on the desktop had absolutely no effect on my computer. Say I had disk copy open, and it was in front (Disk Copy Menu displayed at top of screen), in my case when I click on the desktop, Disk Copy and its menu are still the active app.

All of the problems I described above were happening just as I described them. I know what 10.1 is supposed to do, and items 1 and 2 you mentioned are correct. The problem is that my system was not doing that.

The fix is really quite simple. I trashed the Finder.pref file, and when I logged out/in all was back to normal

Jason

P.S. After trashing the Finder.pref everything was back to normal, however after 5 or 6 hours I tried to switch desktops and it was a no go. None of the other problems mentioned above appeared, but I could not switch the DP. I trashed the Finder.prefs once again and all is well. Not a big deal at all, just a little annoying if it is a constant problem.