Author | Thread |
User 17.10.2011 16:13:21 | RemoteBuddy re-ordering Login Items causing Finder to steal focus from Plex on startup | |
This posting is older than 6 months and can contain outdated information. I start RemoteBuddy along with a number of other utils on my HTPC, with Plex being the last. In this release of RemoteBuddy I've found that the feature added to "fix" a hidden login item record is constantly re-ordering my login items list. I've tried every combination of settings I could figure: disabling the "start on login" option in RB while adding it manually to the login items causes RB to remove the item, and if I enable it and order the apps as I want them RB will remove itself from the list and append itself to the end on startup. My short term solution is to use the "Activate Behaviour on Startup" option which causes RB to activate Plex once it finishes starting. I don't like this approach as it ruins the nice clean startup I had going for some time. A better solution would be an option in RB to have it leave my login items alone, I really don't think the app has any business messing with my system preferences like this! On a related note, I've noticed that RB is quite a bit slower in starting up. I'm now running an almost stock configuration on a 2010 mini w/ 8gb of mem and a decent HD, but RB still takes 10+ seconds to become active, which is exacerbating the above issue. I wouldn't even notice the slowdown if the app weren't taking focus from Plex (well really it's causing the Finder menu bar to appear over the Plex ui...) Any tips or direction would be appreciated!
| These entries from the FAQ may be relevant to this topic: Behaviours
There are several possible error sources:
- The application has been installed after Remote Buddy has already been launched
For efficiency reasons, Remote Buddy only searches for supported applications when its started. If you have installed an application after launching Remote Buddy, please quit Remote Buddy and launch it anew.
- Oudated program versions
The installed version of the program in question could be outdated and identify itself with a different Bundle Identifier than the version supported by Remote Buddy. This problem often occurs with Mplayer OS X. The most recent version of that application is not to be found on Sourceforge but on directly on the pages of Mplayer HQ.
- Custom menus
If you use a custom menu in Remote Buddy and you don't make use of Remote Buddy's smart folders, the menu structure is static. You have to manually add the behaviour into a place of your choice in the menu.
- The behaviour is deactivated.
Make sure, the checkbox in front of the Behaviour's name in the Mappings pane of the preferences is active.
- The Launch Services database is outdated.
Remote Buddy uses Launch Services to check for the availability of an application on your Mac. If the Launch Services database of OS X is incomplete or outdated, so is Remote Buddy's dynamically created menu. The solution, though is easy. Download LSRefresh, launch it, select the application(s) that don't turn up in Remote Buddy's menu, wait until the update is finished and then restart Remote Buddy.
Hardware - Apple® Remote
To enable you to use all capabilities of the IR Receiver of your Mac®, Remote Buddy is using its own driver. In contrast, all other applications with integrated Apple® Remote support usually use the OS X Apple® Remote subsystem.
As long as you're running Remote Buddy, Remote Buddy and its driver are responsible for turning the received button presses into actions. As soon as you quit Remote Buddy, this task is again handled by the OS X Apple® Remote subsystem.
If other applications don't use the interface to the OS X Apple® Remote subsystem correctly, this can lead to the effect that nothing happens when you press a button on your Apple® Remote. For as long as you're running Remote Buddy, issues like this are covered by Remote Buddy and it's driver and are therefore not visible to you. However, as soon as you quit Remote Buddy, the OS X Apple® Remote subsystem is back in control and any issues caused in it by other applications become visible.
Therefore Remote Buddy is neither the cause of the issue nor is it responsible for it. Instead, the cause of the issue exists independently of Remote Buddy. It's located elsewhere and can also only be solved there.
Although our products can't cause any such issues, we're regularly contacted about such issues and asked for help. In order to make locating and fixing the cause of such issues as easy and efficient as possible, we've developed a free diagnostics tool: Remote Control Diagnostics. It can locate issues with a single click and will provide you with information about the issue as well as with instructions on how you can fix it.
Hardware - Wii™ Remote In order to automatically activate the Bluetooth® Receiver on startup, enter the settings, choose "Hardware", then click on "Bluetooth® Receiver". Finally activate the checkbox "Search for supported remotes on startup". Remote Buddy will then automatically look for remote control paired through the "Setup Wizard" on next startup.
| User 20.10.2011 11:37:01 | Re: RemoteBuddy re-ordering Login Items causing Finder to steal focus from Plex on startup | |
This posting is older than 6 months and can contain outdated information. Thanks for asking. Remote Buddy should only re-generate its entry in your login items (and re-launch subsequently) when you've checked the "hidden" checkbox of its entry, because - if that option is checked - it will prevent Remote Buddy's menu from appearing. Regarding startup time: Actually, Remote Buddy has recently gotten a lot faster during start up, because it now skips the most time intensive part for those of its 100+ Behaviour plugins that aren't needed on a particular system - which is loading them in full. Please keep in mind that, when you are launching many applications on startup, all of them will launch at once and try to get their application's data from different parts of your HD, causing it to seek around a lot. Seeking a lot, however, will make even the fastest HD crawl. That's also the reason why applications launch much, much faster on SSD-equipped systems: there's no magnetic read/write head that needs to reposition and wait until the platter rotates to the point where the head can read the wanted data from it (which can quickly add up). Keeping that in mind, chances are that, when you last updated your copy of Plex, Remote Buddy - or any other app you launch at login time, OS X stored their data at a greater distance from each other, increasing the impact of seeking. Best regards, Felix Schwarz
| User 20.10.2011 16:38:00 | Re: RemoteBuddy re-ordering Login Items causing Finder to steal focus from Plex on startup | |
This posting is older than 6 months and can contain outdated information. Felix- Thanks for responding, here's my thoughts on the issue: RemoteBuddy will modify the login items whether the Hidden box is checked or not, I've verified this multiple times. RemoteBuddy will also modify the login items on launch whether I have the option check in the RB preference pane or not which I feel is _bad_ practice. It's one thing to remove the login item when I change the state of your apps preferences, but if I've decided I want to tell RB to _not_ launch at login and then _manually_ add my own login item for it where and how I like- then RB should _not_ be modifying _my_ preferences on the next launch. The ordering of login items launching is CRITICAL to some setups. You've implemented a "feature" here that is causing a regression for my use to fix a bug I've never had any trouble with- I've always had the Hidden option checked and had no trouble seeing the menu. In my new launch script (my hopefully temporary solution to the login item bug) I tell Finder to hide it and I've still had no trouble with not seeing the menu. The fact that I had to write a script at all was frustrating, none of the 6 other apps my HTPC launches needed any special handling and this change has broken my nice clean startup on the television. Would it not be a MUCH cleaner approach to simply warn the user if the login item is hidden? The app should _not_ be modifying my preferences, and if I want it to launch hidden then that's my call, perhaps I plan to make it visible later using a script. As for the launch time, as I mentioned in my post it was nowhere near as noticeable when RB wasn't causing the Finder menu to pop up over top of Plex as my HTPC launches. Where I had a clean startup that went straight into Plex with the desktop never appearing I now have multiple flashes on the screen as RB and Plex fight for focus. So can't we just agree that I won't use the "Hidden" checkbox, you'll warn me if I do, and RB will leave my login items alone with the exception of either adding it or removing it when I click the checkbox in preferences? Thanks for your time and the product. It's an amazing tool!
| User 22.10.2011 00:13:01 | Re: RemoteBuddy re-ordering Login Items causing Finder to steal focus from Plex on startup | |
This posting is older than 6 months and can contain outdated information. Thanks for your feedback. Remote Buddy re-creating the Launch Items every time was a bug and has been fixed with version 1.19. When the issues caused by selecting "Hidden" in the Login Items came up first, I made Remote Buddy's menu detect and unhide the application at run time as necessary. It soon turned out, however, that this was not sufficient. In fact, there were more complex issues caused by selecting "Hidden", that users - IIRC even in this very forum - reported. The only viable fix for these issues is to re-create the entry and subsequently re-launch the application (which, unless the user selects "Hidden" again, only happens once). An info requester is not an option, because it, too, would be hidden and not be visible to the user. If you're willing to live with possible side effects of having Remote Buddy launched hidden, please file a short support inquiry and I'll tell you how you can turn off this "auto-correction" in private. I've added that UI-less option to 1.19, too. Best regards, Felix Schwarz
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