Blink when alert sound setting not working

[Ben J.]

After going Sonoma, everytime there is an alert sound, like when a notification pops up, I get an annoying "blink" on both my displays. I found that you can turn this on or off in System settings - Accessabillity - Sound - "Blink when…".

The problem is - it doesn't work. I cannot get these blinks to go away.
Anyone on Sonoma see this?

 

[bogdanw]

You can try from Terminal:
- to read the value

defaults read com.apple.universalaccess flashScreen

0 is disabled, 1 is enabled

- to disable

defaults write com.apple.universalaccess flashScreen 0

and log out

 

[Ben J.]

Many thanks. I was hoping for something like that. I'm not very good at Terminal.

I checked, and the status is 0. Disabled. So I've not run the disable command. I'll try to log out and in, and see if that helps.

Thanks again.

 

[Ben J.]

Nope. Logging out and in did not help.
Status still says "0".
I tried your command for setting it from terminal, and got this:

Bens-Mac-Mini:~ benjenssen$ defaults write com.apple.universalaccess flashScreen 0
2023-11-26 13:17:25.407 defaults[93832:3623649] Could not write domain com.apple.universalaccess; exiting

Seems like it's having trouble writing to the file?

 

[bogdanw]

If you enable it from System Settings, does the read command return 1?
If not, you can try to delete the plist file ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.universalaccess.plist, log out, then set again in System Settings.

 

[Ben J.]

Ha! You know, just now when I got the mail notification from your reply dropping in, the blink was gone! I guess it must have been the defaults write command that I entered 30 mins ago, that did it. Despite the "Could not write domain com.apple.universalaccess" error.
I think I'll leave it at that. I wouldn't like to default all my accessibility settings.

Thanks for your help.

 

[Ben J.]

Just had another email notification.
The blink is definitely gone.
Hurra.

 

[Ben J.]

The 'blink' issue I had is gone, but I just noticed that while zoomed in (with the zoom feature in accessability settings), if the notification was invisible because it was outside the visible area, the blink was back. I guess it makes sense. Just posting for anyone who might find it useful.

 

[cannfoddr]

I've just had a new corporate build with exactly the same issue with regard to the screen flash. On my machine I get no alerts sounds played at all - if I go into settings screen flash is off in accessibility. If I go to sounds and play the alert sound or choose another one I just get a screen flash.

I am wondering if one of the many configuration profiles has changed something beyond my control?

 

[Zigman]

I am having the same issue with this. Super annoying, even pressing something incorrectly, like escape an extra time, the screen flashes. I have tried everything and I cannot seemed to disable this, must be a bug. Anyone who has had this issue have any luck with fixing this?

Update: I shut the computer down and turned it back on and it seems to resolve itself.

 

[Ben J.]

I wonder; could it be as simple as having the mac sound on mute automatically sets the screen to flash when there is an alert sound? That would explain a restart fixing it. Can't be bothered to check right now.