Open With shows all apps repeated multiple times? [Mac Systems]

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From: AES on 14 Mar 2010 11:52

Any time I access the "Open With" command from any starting point -- for
example in contextual menus, or in Get Info -- on my MacBook OS 10.4.11
system, each of the available apps is listed repeatedly, anywhere from 3
to 8 times.

These all work -- e.g., for a .txt file I can select any of the 3 to 8
consecutive listings for BBedit, then Bean, then Eudora, then TextEdit,
and it will work -- but it makes for an inconveniently lengthy drop-down
menu.

Any way to clean this up, or reset whatever file (?) stores these
listings?

From: DvC on 14 Mar 2010 12:38

From: J.J. O'Shea on 14 Mar 2010 15:17

On Sun, 14 Mar 2010 11:52:32 -0400, AES wrote
(in article
<siegman-33B04F.08523214032010(a)bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>):

> Any time I access the "Open With" command from any starting point -- for
> example in contextual menus, or in Get Info -- on my MacBook OS 10.4.11
> system, each of the available apps is listed repeatedly, anywhere from 3
> to 8 times.
>
> These all work -- e.g., for a .txt file I can select any of the 3 to 8
> consecutive listings for BBedit, then Bean, then Eudora, then TextEdit,
> and it will work -- but it makes for an inconveniently lengthy drop-down
> menu.
>
> Any way to clean this up, or reset whatever file (?) stores these
> listings?

1 Proceed to <username>/Library/Preferences and look for
com.apple.LaunchServices.plist.

2 Drag that file to the Trash.

3 Reboot.

4 Empty the Trash.

The record of all apps which have been used, and where they are, and what
they do, has now been removed. This means that when you launch something your
Mac will think that this is the first time you've used it, and will put up
the 'Are you sure you want to do that?' dialog. It also means that all the
duplicate items in the 'Open With' list will be gone.

You get the dupes by having multiple volumes with the same applications
installed. If, for example, you have a boot volume, and a volume cloned from
the boot volume, and a Time Machine backup volume, you might have up to three
examples of the same app listed. Killing the Launch Services plist will clear
the paths to the other copies of the app.

Note that you can use file utilities such as Onyx and, I think, TinkerTool,
to reset Launch Services as well.

--
email to oshea dot j dot j at gmail dot com.

From: Jolly Roger on 14 Mar 2010 15:50

In article
<siegman-33B04F.08523214032010(a)bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
AES <siegman(a)stanford.edu> wrote:

> Any time I access the "Open With" command from any starting point -- for
> example in contextual menus, or in Get Info -- on my MacBook OS 10.4.11
> system, each of the available apps is listed repeatedly, anywhere from 3
> to 8 times.
>
> These all work -- e.g., for a .txt file I can select any of the 3 to 8
> consecutive listings for BBedit, then Bean, then Eudora, then TextEdit,
> and it will work -- but it makes for an inconveniently lengthy drop-down
> menu.
>
> Any way to clean this up, or reset whatever file (?) stores these
> listings?

When Launch Services updates its database, it examines all applications
on all mounted volumes, building a list of file types and all
applications that report the ability to access that type of file. If you
have multiple volumes mounted with the same applications, the result is
duplicate entries in the various menus that display such application
lists, such as the Open With menu.

You can rebuild the Launch Services database with the Mac OS X built-in
'lsregister' command-line tool, which should clear old, crufty stuff
from it. Here's how to do it in Mac OS X 10.5 or later:

/System/Library/Frameworks/CoreServices.framework/Versions/A/Frameworks/L
aunchServices.framework/Versions/A/Support/lsregister -kill -r -domain
local -domain system -domain user

In earlier Mac OS X versions, Apple placed the Launch Services framework
in a difference directory. Google will show you where that is, if needed.

Hope this helps.

--
Send responses to the relevant news group rather than email to me.
E-mail sent to this address may be devoured by my very hungry SPAM
filter. Due to Google's refusal to prevent spammers from posting
messages through their servers, I often ignore posts from Google
Groups. Use a real news client if you want me to see your posts.

JR

From: Tom Stiller on 14 Mar 2010 16:09

In article <nospam-873526.12382914032010(a)news.telus.net>,
DvC <nospam(a)globetrotter.net> wrote:

> In article
> <siegman-33B04F.08523214032010(a)bmedcfsc-srv02.tufts.ad.tufts.edu>,
> AES <siegman(a)stanford.edu> wrote:
>
> > Any time I access the "Open With" command from any starting point -- for
> > example in contextual menus, or in Get Info -- on my MacBook OS 10.4.11
> > system, each of the available apps is listed repeatedly, anywhere from 3
> > to 8 times.
> >
> > These all work -- e.g., for a .txt file I can select any of the 3 to 8
> > consecutive listings for BBedit, then Bean, then Eudora, then TextEdit,
> > and it will work -- but it makes for an inconveniently lengthy drop-down
> > menu.
> >
> > Any way to clean this up, or reset whatever file (?) stores these
> > listings?
>
> Maybe it is possible thru the Terminal, but a free app like OnyX
> <http://www.titanium.free.fr/> will permit you to rebuild the Launch
> Services.

I think a normal restart following a "Safe" boot (i.e with the shift key
depressed) will also rebuild the LaunchServices database.

--
Tom Stiller

PGP fingerprint = 5108 DDB2 9761 EDE5 E7E3 7BDA 71ED 6496 99C0 C7CF

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