Monday, June 4, 2012

Lion Zombie Document Mystery Solved

Matt Neuburg:

Here’s the answer: If an application is running at the time you shut down the computer (or restart or log out), that application will reopen its zombie windows the next time it is launched, even if you have told it not to.

I, too, have found that the only way to prevent zombies (and get the firewall working properly) is to manually quit every app before shutting down or restarting.

This paragraph doesn’t seem right, though:

The purpose of Sudden Termination is to support Resume (wouldn’t you know it?); most applications (perhaps all) that support Resume also support Sudden Termination, and it’s here that the trouble lies.

Applications have to opt into Sudden Termination via NSSupportsSuddenTermination, which predates Resume. I’ve seen lots of applications that Resume but few that support Sudden Termination.

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Yup this resume document issue is getting on my nerves too. When I quit Xcode and then open it later, I'm tired of seeing a file being opened (e.g. an Info.plist I previously examined in Xcode - because a genius thought that opening a bloatware like Xcode is faster than using the Property List Editor application -).

Other zombie issues in 10.7 include:

- windows appearing and then vanishing on login. Usually, it happens when you install an application using a package from a disk image and a restart was required.
- minimized windows being in the Dock and when you click them, they disappear.

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