Resolved Symlink icons stuck in dock after OS 10.11.5 update

[GiveMeAnthony]

I've recently updated to OS 10.11.5 on my 13" Macbook Pro Retina and am experiencing an issue with symlinks. Whenever I open up a symlink pointing to an executable inside a dot-app package (or opening directly), the icon stays in the dock even after closing the application. I cannot force quit these icons out. These are the symlinks I have in /usr/local/bin in particular.

lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel     9 Apr 14 17:15 love -> love_10-1
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    51 Apr 14 17:14 love_10-1 -> /usr/local/Love2D/love_10-1.app/Contents/MacOS/love
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    50 May 24 18:01 love_6-2 -> /usr/local/Love2D/love_6-2.app/Contents/MacOS/love
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    50 May 23 12:39 love_7-2 -> /usr/local/Love2D/love_7-2.app/Contents/MacOS/love
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    50 May 23 12:48 love_8-0 -> /usr/local/Love2D/love_8-0.app/Contents/MacOS/love
lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    50 May 23 12:49 love_9-2 -> /usr/local/Love2D/love_9-2.app/Contents/MacOS/love

As you can see, these symlinks all point to an executable within a dot-app package. These are different versions of the Love2D engine if you were curious.

Whichever way I open these executables, an icon is left stuck in the dock and I cannot force close it. The last command is different in that a proper icon is shown (whereas the symlinks show a blank icon). The only way I can launch the executable without it getting stuck is to launch the app itself. If I launch the app as a whole, nothing gets stuck. However, I need to be able to access this program from command line, that's why I set up these symlinks.

13" MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X El Capitan (10.11.5)

 

[leman]

The correct way to start apps from command line is using the open command:

open -a love_10-1.app

etc. You shouldn't start the app executable directly. Instead of symlinks, make short scripts or aliases.

 

[GiveMeAnthony]

The correct way to start apps from command line is using the open command:

open -a love_10-1.app

etc. You shouldn't start the app executable directly. Instead of symlinks, make short scripts or aliases.

I'll make alias' I guess then. I still consider this a bug though, because it worked just fine in OS 10.11.4

 

[leman]

I'll make alias' I guess then. I still consider this a bug though, because it worked just fine in OS 10.11.4

Undefined behaviour is undefined As I wrote, the proper way to launch an app bundle from terminal is using the open command.

 

[colinpeters]

I'm getting very similar behavior, not from symlinks, but from Java programs. In particular, Minecraft, and also the Java control panel for Oracle Java (which I downloaded while trying to figure out the Minecraft problem). The thing that is common between both of these is that they are executing their own copy of Java from within the app. They both leave unkillable, non-responding "java" icons on my dock after the applications finish, and this started happening with 10.11.5. Force quit has no effect, and the system will not shutdown or restart once one of these is on the dock.

(After running and quitting Minecraft twice since boot, two instances of Minecraft's icon left on the dock, saying "This application is not responding.")

Funny thing, though, it doesn't affect OpenOffice. Maybe it's using Apple's Java?

I'm guessing the same thing that makes executing through a symlink a problem might also be affecting how some Java programs start Java. I'm kind of surprised I haven't been able to find more about it, especially since it affects Minecraft. I guess nobody else plays Minecraft on OS X?

I would love to hear if anyone has a workaround, or even a hint that this might be fixed some time down the road. It's pretty frustrating having to forcibly shut down my Mac every few days to get rid of the zombie icons on the dock, and I'm worried what will happen if some update wants to restart my computer when it can't.

 

[GiveMeAnthony]

I'm guessing the same thing that makes executing through a symlink a problem might also be affecting how some Java programs start Java. I'm kind of surprised I haven't been able to find more about it, especially since it affects Minecraft. I guess nobody else plays Minecraft on OS X?

I would love to hear if anyone has a workaround, or even a hint that this might be fixed some time down the road. It's pretty frustrating having to forcibly shut down my Mac every few days to get rid of the zombie icons on the dock, and I'm worried what will happen if some update wants to restart my computer when it can't.

Mac hasn't been the go-to platform for PC gamers, especially since Windows dominates proprietary vendor support. I use to play Minecraft, perhaps I'll pick it up again and see if I can find a workaround to this.

 

[colinpeters]

Mac hasn't been the go-to platform for PC gamers, especially since Windows dominates proprietary vendor support. I use to play Minecraft, perhaps I'll pick it up again and see if I can find a workaround to this.

Thanks, I'm not a hard-core gamer, probably buy one game a decade or so, but since my iMac is "the desktop" in our house, it's where I play my couple of games. Minecraft has worked fine up until now (although there was this nasty bug with bluetooth sound a couple of years ago that also hit Minecraft--again not a problem with Minecraft itself), I was just a bit surprised because zillions of kids play Minecraft and nobody else seems to be complaining about this that I can find.

 

[GiveMeAnthony]

Alright, so I think I've isolated how to reproduce the issue consistently. The symptoms seem to occur when an executable instance with its own dock icon launches from within or call into an archive. For my case, using Love2D through symlinks, I'm executing from within a dot-app package (actually a file system directory, but acts like an archive on the OS X frontend) and calling an external lua script. For your case, you're executing the "/System/CoreServices/Jar Launcher.app" app, which is just a wrapper for the "java -jar" command, that then calls a jar file (actually just a specialized ZIP archive). The jar file will call run one of its internal class files. I tried to recreate the issue by creating a __main__.py file, putting it into a zip file, and running python on that zip file. The symptoms weren't recreated in this case because python doesn't create a dock icon with its instance. All this being said, this appears to be a frontend issue. The executables themselves aren't actually running (you can check with Activity Monitor).

 

[GiveMeAnthony]

@colinpeters Do you happen to have Wacom driver software installed? I recently uninstalled it from Wacom utility and the BambooCore in Login Items (>Sys Pref>Usres & Groups>Log-in items) and now this problem is gone.

 

[colinpeters]

@colinpeters Do you happen to have Wacom driver software installed? I recently uninstalled it from Wacom utility and the BambooCore in Login Items (>Sys Pref>Usres & Groups>Log-in items) and now this problem is gone.

Sorry for the late reply, I didn't see an email update from this thread. I'd just signed up to note that the same thing seems to have happened to me with the Adobe Flash Player Install Manager (stuck on the dock after install managing has finished). In fact I do have a Wacom Bamboo tablet, so I'll give this a go and report back.

 

[colinpeters]

Well how about that. It worked.

You don't even need to uninstall the Wacom drivers. I just went to Users & Groups, Login items, and removed the "Bamboo Core" application. (I never used the Bamboo utilities anyway, and had turned them off, or so I thought.) As an experiment, I tried it out in that state, after rebooting, and Minecraft now properly disappears from the Dock when I quit it, and I can still use my Wacom tablet, too.

It's bizarre that a simple utility can have such an effect on other applications, but since I wasn't using the utility anyway, I'll take what I can get.

Thanks for your help.