Applications not working

[vinf1racer]

Machine: New Macbook

Was rearranging my dock 2 days back which involved deleting some program icons from dock. All of a sudden some appz dont work. When I click the dock icon it leads me to that program folder within "Applications" i.e. firefox folder where i can see a folder << contents >> inside that are the following:
info.plist
MacOS (folder)
PkgInfo
Plug-ins (folder)
Resources (folder)

The "MacOS" folder has a firefox unix executable. Clicking on that starts up the terminal and firefox finally starts. Cannot find Firefox.app anywhere

This is the same case with other apps i.e. iphoto, iDVD, iwork, dictionary etc. All the missing programs have a folder in "Applications" which have a "MacOS" directory which contains a working unix executable.

I'm stumped....It's driving me nuts.

P.S. Also need to know how to get the dictionary and frontrow to work...

 

[JediMeister]

The applications are no longer being treated as packages. Re-add the .app file extensions manually and restart the computer before trying to open them again. Haven't heard of this happening from removing items from the Dock though...

 

[vinf1racer]

Really appreciate the quick response. I'm relatively new to the mac. Still unclear about: how to find the .app extensions. Adding, i suppose would be to put the .app in the << contents >> folder. Thanks for the help...

 

[JediMeister]

Firefox should be named Firefox.app. Either click twice slowly on the name and make the change, or select the folder, bring up the Get Info window, and in the Name & Extension field add the .app, and hit the enter/return key to save changes.

 

[vinf1racer]

Worked like a charm. Thanks a million. Really appreciate the prompt reply.