Re: System 6.0.1 bugs?

[Jim Murphy <murph@apple.com>]

In article <C9FwGI.A35@well.sf.ca.us> Joe Kohn, joko@well.sf.ca.us writes:
> Well, the other day someone mentioned that with the new option to drag
> DA's, fonts, etc to the System folder, after dragging one successfully,
> the System folder would turn yellow, and any other files dragged to
> System folder

     Yes, this does indeed happen. Since I've always had had my System
folder on the desktop (where the problem does not occur), I had never seen
it. Now I have. :-) It's really an unfortunate oversight in some new-for-
6.0.1 honkin' cool code that makes your Finder life generally much easier.


[ Slightly long-winded techish sort of talk follows - beware. ]


     Finder 6.0 never noticed when files changed due to the actions of
other programs, such as Finder Extensions. Programmers had to manually
inform Finder that they had done something behind it's back with the
request tellFinderAboutChange. This has, ahem, been changed for 6.0.1 so
that Finder notices all files changing automagically, and it redraws its
windows to reflect them.

     However, the code is a wee bit too thorough, and ignores the special
status of a few folders, including the System folder. When the code is
called, it updates the icon to reflect what it thinks is a change in the
System folder's directory entry, because the auxType field does not match
what is stored in the folder's icon object. Normally all folders have an
auxType of zero, so the Finder takes advantage of this and stores some of
the special folders in memory with non-zero auxType values to indicate
which icon it should use to draw. When the code is called, it copies the
zero value from the directory entry into the iconObj, which causes the
folder to become a plain and boring normal folder.

     This can problem can also be dupicated in a number of other ways.
A simple one is to go into Preferences and change the hide/show invisible
files option temporarially with the boot volume's root window open and
the System folder visible. The icon will become un-special just as it did
with routing. This is not a terrible fatal problem, and many have
discovered the first simple solution which is to close the window and re-
open it. My suggestion, however, is to leave your System folder on the
desktop (like Dave and I do).

> About Pointless and 6.0.1, there seems to be an incompatibility problem
> with 6.0.1 and the Choose Font option when Pointless is installed.

     Yep, I've looked into this one as well. It seems that when you have
a TrueType font installed with no bitmaps generated, Pointless doesn't
tell the system that there are any sizes available for use. ChooseFont
under 6.0.1 assumes that if a font exists (that is, we have been
told the name of a font family through any means), at least one face of
any size also exists. The blame for this is probably ChooseFont's, but
we'll have to argue that some more.


Jim Murphy                                                 murph@apple.com

"...never quite said what I wanted to say to you,                 The Cure
  never quite managed the words to explain to you..."             Untitled