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Applications greyed out

Hi

Have just tried to open an application in Finder only to find all Applications greyed out. Can anyone offer a solution?

Thanks

David

iMac 27″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Oct 2, 2021 1:40 AM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Oct 2, 2021 8:13 AM

Hello, DavidRT.


It sounds like something has confused macOS.

Reboot your Mac and see if the problem is cleared. If rebooting your Mac doesn’t fix things, see if the problem still happens in Safe mode (hold the shift key down at startup). It can take much longer to safe boot (10 min) so be patient.

How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support 


Safe mode forces the OS to clear certain caches and logs and do other miscellaneous housekeeping. It's non-destructive to user data so is safe to do. Very often certain weird software behavior is corrected by simply logging in this way as a troubleshooting method. When you're in safe boot, the machine will not be at its best performance, especially with graphics, but that's expected.


Does the problem persist while in Safe mode?


Exit safe mode by restarting your Mac normally and re-evaluate the issue again.

If the problem is still unresolved, please return here and post a reply and we’ll see if we can come up with additional help.

3 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Oct 2, 2021 8:13 AM in response to DavidRT

Hello, DavidRT.


It sounds like something has confused macOS.

Reboot your Mac and see if the problem is cleared. If rebooting your Mac doesn’t fix things, see if the problem still happens in Safe mode (hold the shift key down at startup). It can take much longer to safe boot (10 min) so be patient.

How to use safe mode on your Mac - Apple Support 


Safe mode forces the OS to clear certain caches and logs and do other miscellaneous housekeeping. It's non-destructive to user data so is safe to do. Very often certain weird software behavior is corrected by simply logging in this way as a troubleshooting method. When you're in safe boot, the machine will not be at its best performance, especially with graphics, but that's expected.


Does the problem persist while in Safe mode?


Exit safe mode by restarting your Mac normally and re-evaluate the issue again.

If the problem is still unresolved, please return here and post a reply and we’ll see if we can come up with additional help.

Applications greyed out

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