How can I get rid of the "Choose Application" window that sometimes appears in OS X?

March 5, 2010 11:25 AM

How can I get rid of the "Choose Application" window that sometimes appears in OS X?

An example: When I open Photoshop I get a window asking "Where is Photoshop?" It then tells me to choose the applications from the list of applications on my mac. Meanwhile, Photoshop is open and working fine.

This happens on a dozen or so programs and I don't have a clue why. I've searched online but to no avail.

posted by Outis to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

Are you trying to open the application or a document? (It's unclear why you are trying to open Photoshop if it is already open, as you say.) If a document type is not associated with Photoshop, open info with command-I and select Photoshop in the "Open with" section.

If you are clicking the icon in the dock and this is happening, try removing it from the doc and dragging it again from the Applications folder to the dock. It might be that what is in the dock is not actually a link to the application.
posted by whiskeyspider at 11:30 AM on March 5, 2010

Seconding what whiskeyspider said. I recommend after associating a file type with Photoshop, you click the "Change All" button to change the association globally across your computer.
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 11:34 AM on March 5, 2010

Response by poster: This isn't due to opening a particular file, but the actual application from within the Applications folder. Particular files are associated properly.
posted by Outis at 11:44 AM on March 5, 2010

It sounds like you need to rebuild your launch services database. Your Mac may have lost track of what app opens what and where the apps are located. I resorted to this after the "open with..." and "change all" wouldn't work (for some reason an m4p would always open with mpeg streamclip rather than Quicktime...if i did the "change all" treatment on it, Finder would remember to open that file only with Quicktime and any other m4p file with streamclip).
posted by birdherder at 11:44 AM on March 5, 2010

Best answer: This sounds more like the prompt that you get when an Applescript can't resolve an application's name to an actual application. Are you sure the thing you're clicking on is actually the application? Does Photoshop run some applescripts on startup? (I'm not a Photoshop user, so I don't know.)
posted by hattifattener at 12:18 PM on March 5, 2010

Best answer: Hattifattener is correct. The dialog you're seeing is when a script attempts to reference an application that, for some reason or another, isn't found. It could be that the script was written incorrectly (app was referenced wrong). I can't explain what script is running or why one is running in the first place, however.
posted by secret about box at 1:38 PM on March 5, 2010

Are you opening Photoshop from the Dock and getting this error? If so, remove the icon from the dock and launch Photoshop by double clicking your hard drive -> Applications -> Adobe Photoshop -> Adobe Photoshop.app (the .app may be hidden). Photoshop should launch and be near the far right end of your dock. Right click on the icon in the dock and select the option to Keep In Dock.
posted by inviolable at 2:50 PM on March 5, 2010

Response by poster: None of these things seem to apply, though the Applescript hypothesis is interesting. I'm opening the app from the Applications folder, I've rebuilt the launch services, and such. I'm not one to use Applescripts, so that confuses me.
posted by Outis at 5:48 PM on March 7, 2010

Response by poster: Thanks to everyone. I deleted the Scripts folder from Photoshop and the dialogue when away. It's odd, I'd never used any scripts before and it came up a few months ago.
posted by Outis at 5:58 PM on March 7, 2010