Fix my stalling, un-force-quittable iChat! (please!)

September 24, 2005 4:25 PM

Fix my stalling, un-force-quittable iChat! (please!)

So one day last week, iChat stopped working on my desktop.

Stopped working means:
When I start my computer up and open up iChat, iChat will open, and say "Connecting". Then the window will grow to include all of my groups. When its working correctly, these groups will then populate with all of the people online, however right now it stops there and freezes. If I force-quit, the window disappears, but iChat remains open, according to the dock. At that point I can force quit all I like but it won't do anything.

Mac OS X 10.4

posted by sirion to computers & internet (4 comments total)

First thing I would probably do is make a backup of your preferences file (in your user -> library -> preferences folder) and then trash the original. Put the backup on the desktop or someplace not in your user library.

(there might be 5 or so files with the word iChat in them, find them easily with spotlight or the search bar when you open up your Macintosh HD)

Start iChat back up. See if it works. If it doesn't, you can probably put the preferences file back in if you want your preferences back. iChat will automatically create new ones for you, though.

Next thing I might try is applications -> utilities -> disk utilities and run verify permissions... no idea if this will affect anything in iChat, but sometimes it helps (not a bad idea to do it from time to time anyway). That's all I've got. Good luck.
posted by starman at 4:52 PM on September 24, 2005

By the way, if you trash your preferences, you might lose your contact list, so that's why I say make a backup.
posted by starman at 4:53 PM on September 24, 2005

Your contact list is safely stored on the server, you can't accidentally wipe it.
posted by Mwongozi at 5:12 PM on September 24, 2005

The most likely cause is that your ichat preference lists are the most likely think to have become corrupted.

Toss in a folder in your desktop (forcing ichat to recreate them):

com.apple.ichat.ichat.plist
""""" jabber.plist
""""" AIM.plist
""""" Subnet.plist
""""" ichatagent.plist

You don't need to drop your whole prefence folder...just those should be the ichat items

/your user/Library/Preferences
posted by filmgeek at 5:23 PM on September 24, 2005