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March 22, 2007
Suitcase Login Items Coup
I ran into a particularly vexing problem with Extensis Suitcase at work recently, and I thought I'd share the problem here (of all places) for a couple reasons.
First, discussion boards on the web are littered with other people who have had the same problem, and few good solutions are offered.
Second, the solution is completely counter-intuitive: nobody expects developers to over-ride system settings in such a way that it appears the system is malfunctioning. So one could spend hours trouble-shooting all sorts of complex things to try to solve it, and fail miserably, when the solution for most of us will be quite simple - we're just looking in the wrong place.
Problem:
When you install Extensis Suitcase, it will add itself to the Login Items (System Preferences > Accounts > My Account > Login Items) for every account on the Mac. This will tell Suitcase to launch whenever anyone logs into any account on the Mac.
Obviously, there will be some users who won't want Suitcase to launch every time they log in as they don't use the application. As irritating as Extensis' presumption is, most people would probably know they simply need to remove Suitcase from the list of "Login Items" in System Preferences. The problem is, you can't. Clicking the "-" button to remove the item will work with any other application, but it won't work with Suitcase. What happens? Nothing. The button doesn't work.
Worse still, the problem appears to be some kind of malfunction, as if something is wrong with System Preferences. Most users would be forgiven for searching through "Startup Items" folders, deleting Preference files and chasing other wild geese, because as I said above - nobody expects software developers to over-ride system settings in such a way that it appears the system is malfunctioning. Who would do such a thing!?! Extensis, it seems.
Solution:
Assuming you haven't deleted Extensis Suitcase and all associated files in a fit of rage...
Launch Suitcase and go to Suitcase > Preferences > General > Application Options, and untick "Open Suitcase automatically when you log in"
It took me 2 hours to figure that out. The odds of me looking at Suitcase's preferences for an answer approached zero, for a couple reasons.
First, every time Suitcase launched, I force-quit it more venomously, so the odds of it even launching were slim.
Second - and more importantly -that's not how the operating system is designed. Applications are subordinate to the operating system, and they do not normally launch coups of this kind. If they did, the entire system would collapse in chaos and no one would be able to troubleshoot any problems.
When the time comes that we can replace Suitcase with another, better designed application, I expect we will replace it faster than you can say "Quark."
Posted by Brad at March 22, 2007 12:42 PM
