Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Mac Apps Not Opening or Slow Due to Apple Server Issues: How to Fix For Now

OCSP or Online Certificate Status Protocol is a method used by X509 certificates to validate expiry or cancellation - think of it as the modern version of a certificate revocation list. A browser would contact the ocsp provider to verify if the certificate issued remains valid using its uid. Now its possible that Apple built a mechanism that performs this action for signed applications and this platform (ocsp) is suffering an outage. As a result, there's no response or an invalid one that's being returned. This may result in a requery and therefore people are seeing things hang or fail.
There are 2 potential issues at play here - 1) there is an invalid response due to failure or 2) apple is under attack at ocsp.apple.com

Since certificates are in play in all of Apples application services, there's a possibility something significant has failed (given the new release of Big Sur) and this is now hitting other services (like apple pay etc)...

Just a hypothesis...
 
  • Like
Reactions: robnbill and amartinez1660
I’m glad it wasn’t my Mac mini. I thought maybe something was failing about an hour and a half ago.
 
Oh, the irony...
(Is in Italian, but you still can get the point)
Schermata 2020-11-12 alle 23.55.04.png
 
  • Haha
Reactions: Babygotfont
wlossw said:
what? i meant the problem is actually not occuring with mac store apps.
Click to expand...

and that falls under the want for "open distribution of apps on Mac and iOS" category since notarized apps are not considered "open distribution". my prediction remains accurate.
 
If people were actually concerned about a loss of productivity, they wouldn't have tried installing Big Sur in the first place. I only tried because I have two MBPs.

FWIW, I'm still seeing an error message and going to retry later this evening when there's less traffic/demand.
 
  • Disagree
Reactions: ggab, Sincci, ipponrg and 4 others
bumpylumpy said:
If at all possible, try to have your network or sysadmin add ocsp.apple.com pointing to 0.0.0.0 at the router level, so if you have a company full of Macs you don't end up having to edit every single computer individually.
Click to expand...
This might also minimize problems with other Apple devices such as iPhones, iPads, Apple TVs, etc.

This is completely pathetic.

Steve would be pissed.
 
  • Like
Reactions: alex_free
Allen121 said:
If people were actually concerned about a loss of productivity, they wouldn't have tried installing Big Sur in the first place. I only tried because I have two MBPs.

FWIW, I'm still seeing an error message and going to retry later this evening when there's less traffic/demand.
Click to expand...
This is nothing to do with Big Sur.

I came home, fired up my Mojave Mac mini and can't even move an e-mail message from my inbox to a different folder. So I booted my Windows system and Everything Just Works(TM).

:p

I might install Big Sur just maybe Q2 2021 if Apple gets their **** together.

I have zero interest in Crapalina 2.0.

Right now, I have entered the /etc/hosts workaround. Next is investigating router settings so all of my Apple devices can function at home right now.
 
  • Like
  • Angry
Reactions: Sincci, katbel, mistasopz and 1 other person
I believe this issue has been corrected. We're back up in running. NY-EST territory.
 
I am speechless. I never thought in a million years something like this would happen. Ruined my morning of work and angered a bunch of other people in the (Windows-using) office that expected something from me. Is it the first time there has ever been an issue with this service?
 
  • Like
Reactions: amartinez1660
This has nothing to do with trying to install Big Sur. I opened my macbook today to test an app one of our devs sent me. Nothing on the whole computer worked. The app took a minute to open, it downloaded fine. I restarted the computer and it took 2 minutes to boot to the login screen. Then another 8min to load the finder. I actually thought it was broken, it was like the SDD got replaced with a floppy drive.
 
  • Like
  • Haha
Reactions: tonyr6, makitango and amartinez1660
Today is embarrassing for Apple.

Everyone was wondering why all of a sudden our macs were running slow. We were trying to have a conference call, and it took FOREVER to launch. Some of our IDEs were also crawling. I.T. said they can't do anything about it because Apple needs to fix it from their end.

Who would have thought it was an Apple server issue. Or better yet, why should the Apple server have a direct effect on me launching/using an app that wasn't from the App Store?
 
  • Like
  • Love
Reactions: lostczech, makitango, amartinez1660 and 1 other person
bobbie424242 said:
Your Mac is phoning home, which is perfectly fine since it is the property of Apple, not yours.
That's for SE-CU-RI-TY and your own good, and to save the planet while at it.
You should be grateful for this non-issue that is actually a feature. Just wait a bit longer and your app will start up. Apps never needed to start immediately in the first place.
Click to expand...
This is the stupidest thing i've ever read. My apps don't need to start immediately? Firefox was taking 2 minutes to load. I thought my SSD was failing and proceeded to spend the next hour on diagnosing an issue that didn't exist on my end. I don't need apple to phone home every time I run an app. I am perfectly capable of downloading legit applications.
 
  • Like
Reactions: H2SO4, tonyr6, H818H and 4 others
basehead617 said:
I am speechless. I never thought in a million years something like this would happen. Ruined my morning of work and angered a bunch of other people in the (Windows-using) office that expected something from me. Is it the first time there has ever been an issue with this service?
Click to expand...
I do not recall but for sure it will not be the last.

It will happen again some day to Mac users, it will happen some day to Windows users, it will happen some day to Android users, etc.
 
  • Like
Reactions: amartinez1660
I had just installed Security Update 2020-06 on my iMac running Mojave when it took forever to boot and took forever for apps to open. I thought it was the security update, so I restored my iMac using a cloned backup and that fixed it. This seems like a remarkable coincidence that Apple corrected the issue just when I restored from my backup.

What really annoys me is that I had to sign in to my Dropbox account after the restore and that caused me to lose my grandfathered ability to run Dropbox on more than three devices without paying for a subscription. Thanks Apple.
 
  • Like
Reactions: tonyr6
jakeowens said:
Not sure why there are people on here saying "this screwed up my work." This is the first version of a very new OS. You should be waiting to install this on work machines after a few update points or when you read that it's safe to do so with the apps you need. And THEN install it when you have some free time and a buffer of having to re-install the prior OS if everything doesn't work correctly.
Click to expand...
Because there’s a whole bunch of us who are seeing this on Catalina machines. I’ve not updated to Big Sur and have no intention of doing so in the next few weeks.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back