Finder Windows, mail windows etc opening all over the place

[scouser75]

Hi guys, the following has bugged me forever and am now finally asking for help to see if there's any fix for it.

When I open a Finder or Mail window or Word Docs, they always open all over the place. I personally would prefer they only opened in the same place every time. Is there a way to ensure windows open in the same place every time?

 

[Honza1]

I recall seeing instructions for this on line:
Hold down the option key and while you’re holding it down, arrange the window like you want it and then let go. When you close the application, it should now remember your settings in terms of window location and size.
I googled it since I did tno recall solution. Some complained, that it does not work but there are workarounds and even apps which supposedly fix this. Google it if this does not work.

 

[scouser75]

Thanks Honza, that seems to have worked. I recollect I tried this method a while back after searching on here and Google and it did work but after a while, things went pear-shaped again. But fingers crossed this works.

Unfortunately, this method doesn't work when opening new Word or Excel documents. New docs open here there and everywhere.

It's a minor issue for me so right now not cure I can justify paying for fixes, but might re-consider in future.

 

[Sciuriware]

Thanks Honza, that seems to have worked. I recollect I tried this method a while back after searching on here and Google and it did work but after a while, things went pear-shaped again. But fingers crossed this works.

Unfortunately, this method doesn't work when opening new Word or Excel documents. New docs open here there and everywhere.

It's a minor issue for me so right now not cure I can justify paying for fixes, but might re-consider in future.

... moreover, you may assume that applications that do not remember their window position spoil the party here.
I got similar problems with LibreOffice whose latest releases do not do this.
When you write an application you can do it yourself, so they could have done it!
;JOOP!

 

[scouser75]

Ahh, so Microsoft, Libre etc can programme this possibility into their own software so their windows open up in one position only? And it's not Apple's problem?

 

[DeltaMac]

If a third-party developer chooses to not properly support features that are built-in to the system, then that would be on the developer, and not really on the system itself.

 

[Sciuriware]

Ahh, so Microsoft, Libre etc can programme this possibility into their own software so their windows open up in one position only? And it's not Apple's problem?

I'll explain: I program in C and in JAVA and in both languages you can ask:
where is my window and how big is it? And ... I want to put my window there and such big.
I got it working on Microsoft Windows, on Linux and on MacOS.
So, indeed, if the programmer does not do it, it just does not happen.
;JOOP!

 

[Honza1]

Ahh, so Microsoft, Libre etc can programme this possibility into their own software so their windows open up in one position only? And it's not Apple's problem?

It's not really Apple problem.
As noted above, developer can easily ask system where the window is and move the it where developer wants. The problem is, that you get quickly into giant rabbit hole of options. I wrote toolbox on different platform and nightmare of handling new GUI windows turned out even theoretically difficult. You want to make sure any new window is usable - and that often requires some minimum size and it also needs to be on the visible display area. But, the last saved position may be from previous session when user had attached very different display system (e.g., multiple monitors, different resolutions, even simply different monitor arrangement) and the saved position may be outside of view or on display which has currently no user attention (sidecar?). And that can look to user as if the application crashed - "where is my new window???". So you start checking and making some (kind of arbitrary) decisions on "if this... I do this...". Quickly your code is complicated mess, difficult to maintain, and still failing occasionally.
Or you simply force new window into some well defined default position and size (center of main display) and let user move it later.
Life would be so much easier if all computers had ONLY one display/resolution/monitor size combination and nothing else would be allowed ;-)