Why can't I reliably see my favorite folders on my Mac anymore?

January 21, 2016 8:57 AM

Normally, when I open up the Finder on my MacBook Pro (13-inch, Mid 2012, running OS 10.11.1) in the sidebar to the left of the window, I can see a list of my favorite folders. But lately, sometimes when I open Finder (or when I click "Browse..." to select a file for upload somewhere) the list of Favorites is often missing. Sometimes all that's left is "Media," sometimes it's "Shared." This makes it really difficult to navigate my computer. What is causing this, and how can I fix it?
posted by ocherdraco to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

Best answer: I had this issue when I first installed El Capitan. It seems to have been fixed in one of the maintenance releases. I'm currently at Mac OS X 10.11.2. Are you completely up to date? You might want to check and see if there's a Mac OS update waiting for you in App Store that hasn't been applied yet.
posted by littlerobothead at 9:15 AM on January 21, 2016 [1 favorite]

In the meantime, find the folders by other means and drag them back to recreate the sidebar.
posted by yclipse at 1:16 PM on January 21, 2016

I don’t think it’s specific to 10.11. I’ve had it happen many times in 10.8.5. Haven’t figured it out, but restarting usually fixes it, so an update would appear to as well, whether it did or not.
posted by bongo_x at 3:13 PM on January 22, 2016