10.2 Help Viewer Crash

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dfbills

Senior Member
I just installed 10.2 from my cds and all seems to be working fine except for help viewer. Whenever I launch it, I get a long spinning beach cursor, and then it crashes.

No crashlog is generated. I only get a message saying that the application has unexpectedly quit. Anyone know how to fix this?
 
Problem solved:

I removed all non-apple help files from /Library/Documentation/Help/ and then added the others back in one by one. The problem file was Virex7.help.

Now, the help is working fine.
 
Well youve got me stumped. I have the same problem, except that my PowerBook G4's hard drive also emits a very loud, dangerous sounding high pitched whine while it attempts to load a help file. And my Help folder only contains MacHelp.help, Applescript.help and airport.help. And attemping to load files from all three applications has the same results, frozen, whining Machelp, then crash. Oops!

Nosh
 
You can check the com.apple.help.plist prefs and the help folders in the ~/Library/Documentation/Help/ as well. It seems that the help files are spread all over the place.
 
1) Lag. - Apple's Help system in 10.2 does, when your computer is connected to the net, in fact download the newest versions of the help files. And it tries to everytime. That's why it feels slower than it oughta.

2) High-pitched Sound. - Has been reported by many users so far.

3) Crashes. - Have been reported by many users.

Solution: Don't use Apple's help system until an update is released. There isn't much in it, anyway.
 
There are many items of information that are ONLY in Apple's Help. That's why I had to get mine working again.
 
I experienced the same problem (no whine though). I did as dfbills did and checked the help files located at /Library/Documentation/Help/ and also at /Users/[user name]/Library/Documentation/Help/. I found that an aliased help file in the latter for FAXstf X 10.0.8 was causing the problem. File removed - problem solved.

Now if someone could tell me why NAV Auto-Protect will not load at start-up I will be a happy boy!
 
Originally posted by fryke

Solution: Don't use Apple's help system until an update is released. There isn't much in it, anyway. [/B]
Click to expand...

try using AppleCare in Sherlock....it accesses Apples knowledge database....
 
Alright, I'm having the same Help Viewer crashing problem as described by so many on these boards (minus the high pitched squeal). I tried most of the suggestions of which folders to check and files to remove, but had no luck.

However, I noticed something weird. If I try to launch help from the Finder's drop down menu it crashes. If I launch MacHelp.help directly from /Library/Documentation/Help/ it works fine. I know it's not much of a fix - more of a workaround. But at least you should be able to access your help files. Good luck.
 
Move MacHelp.help into the doc and only access it from there.

otherwise don't use help.

Sorry for the bad answers but i think it's apples problems not ours.

Twister
 
Hi,
I had the same problem.
I solved the problem by deleting (moving) the following files from
User -> "username" -> Library -> Preferences
com.apple.help.plist
com.apple.helpui.list
com.apple.helpviewer.plist

After this Help Viewer started absolutely correct and works fine

rg
 
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