Need Help now... (endless pop up windows)

[Dalton63841]

I also didn't mention any Terminal commands that may be in place, such as showing/hiding hidden files, location and file type choice for screen captures, custom keyboard shortcuts, etc., etc., etc. Creating a new user is great for testing to see if the same symptoms appear on a clean user profile, but actually transferring everything to a new account can be a very big deal, and should be undertaken only as a last resort.

LOL I think you give the average joe user a little too much credit, but like I said, I do agree with you.

I have done it multiple times myself, but I've also learned where everything is at, and for that matter I created a shell script to automate the process for me.

@vmichelle
To avoid having to set up a new account, you may have luck with the program Onyx. It has an option to search for and correct corrupted plists, which is more than likely what is causing the issue.

 

[GGJstudios]

@vmichelle
To avoid having to set up a new account, you may have luck with the program Onyx. It has an option to search for and correct corrupted plists, which is more than likely what is causing the issue.

Why do you keep suggesting things that have nothing to do with the OP's issue? Corrupted .plist files are NOT the cause of those pop-ups. It's the FIREWALL! How many times does it have to be said before you get it? Those messages are generated by the Mac OS X firewall.

 

[Dalton63841]

LOL I DO get it. I'm not trying to be trite. Settings for everything, including the firewall, are stored in plists.

I am not trying to argue with you, but from what I've read it's set for allow incoming connections on everything except a couple. Given that there is more than a couple windows popping up, something must be wrong.

 

[vmichelle]

Who said anything about disabling it? I just asked what your settings are. As it says on the firewall tab, Mac OS X normally determines which programs are allowed incoming connections." You can select specific apps to allow or block receiving incoming connections. For most apps, it's fine to allow. Don't block an app, just because you don't know what it is. All the processes listed on your screen shot are valid components of Mac OS X and should be allowed.

So what you're saying is that I should change them to "allow" and this may fix things?
These are all the ones that are currently blocked:
krb5kdc
nfsd
nmbd
portmap
rpc.lockd
rpc.statd

 

[Dalton63841]

So what you're saying is that I should change them to "allow" and this may fix things?
These are all the ones that are currently blocked:
krb5kdc
nfsd
nmbd
portmap
rpc.lockd
rpc.statd

Yes those definitely should be set to allow. That is quite a few actually. ALthough what is weird is that those are even on the list.

 

[GGJstudios]

So what you're saying is that I should change them to "allow" and this may fix things?
These are all the ones that are currently blocked:
krb5kdc
nfsd
nmbd
portmap
rpc.lockd
rpc.statd

Yes, they are all Mac OS X components. Allow them. The firewall should remember your answer each time one of those messages pops up, so you should only have to click "Allow" once for each app.

 

[vmichelle]

Thanks you guys. It looks like that may be it. I set them all to allow and reset my computer to see if anything would show up at start-up and it looks like everything is running smoothly.

So what is it that (may have) caused my computer to do this initially? It seems the posts were all over the place about a battery issue among other things.

 

[GGJstudios]

Thanks you guys. It looks like that may be it. I set them all to allow and reset my computer to see if anything would show up at start-up and it looks like everything is running smoothly.

So what is it that (may have) caused my computer to do this initially? It seems the posts were all over the place about a battery issue among other things.

Like I said, it was only your firewall. It had nothing to do with battery, PRAM, plists, user accounts, etc. Did you recently change your firewall settings? When you initially choose to set access only for specific services and applications, it has to ask whether you want to block or allow each one the first time they attempt to access the internet. After that, it remembers your answers. There are exceptions, however:

Mac OS X v10.5, 10.6: About the Application Firewall

Some applications check their own integrity when they are run without using code signing. If the Application Firewall recognizes such an application it will not sign it, but then it will re-present the dialog every time the application is run. This may be avoided by upgrading to a version of the application which is signed by its developer.

 

[vmichelle]

Like I said, it was only your firewall. It had nothing to do with battery, PRAM, plists, user accounts, etc. Did you recently change your firewall settings? When you initially set access only for specific services and applications, it has to ask whether you want to block or allow each one the first time they attempt to access the internet. After that, it remembers your answers.

No, I haven't changed any settings. Is there a chance that it has to do with me turning off my computer for the first time in a while? I've put so much use on the poor thing over the past two months I'm amazed it has put up with me for this long without issue.

 

[Dalton63841]

Like I said, it was only your firewall. It had nothing to do with battery, PRAM, plists, user accounts, etc. Did you recently change your firewall settings? When you initially choose to set access only for specific services and applications, it has to ask whether you want to block or allow each one the first time they attempt to access the internet. After that, it remembers your answers.

To be fair, I have never had any of those things pop up asking to be allowed through the firewall. My MBP and Mac Mini are set up for remote ssh access and about a dozen other "non-Average Joe" operations and never had those pop up.

 

[vmichelle]

To be fair, I have never had any of those things pop up asking to be allowed through the firewall. My MBP and Mac Mini are set up for remote ssh access and about a dozen other "non-Average Joe" operations and never had those pop up.

Yeah, lets just say it freaked me out a little this morning. I spent a couple minutes looking at them and then decided to click deny because I only get those popups when I've downloaded new software or something so I assumed the worst of it.

 

[Dalton63841]

Yeah, lets just say it freaked me out a little this morning. I spent a couple minutes looking at them and then decided to click deny because I only get those popups when I've downloaded new software or something so I assumed the worst of it.

If you haven't, I still recommend using Onyx, as it is a great app just to keep things running "top notch". I run it about once a month.

 

[vmichelle]

If you haven't, I still recommend using Onyx, as it is a great app just to keep things running "top notch". I run it about once a month.

Yeah, I'm actually pretty familiar with Onyx. I discovered it a few years ago when I was having "space issues" with my iBook and was doing everything possible to clear up some hard drive space. Definitely will be using it again soon, my computer has had a rough past 2-3 months and I need to treat it to some TLC.

 

[Dalton63841]

Definitely will be using it again soon, my computer has had a rough past 2-3 months and I need to treat it to some TLC.

LOL I know what you mean. My Mini has been acting as a fileserver, webserver, torrentbox, media center and has been converting over 700GB worth of movies from mkv/avi to mp4 for the last like 2 months...poor thing...surprised it hasn't overheated and died by now.

 

[vmichelle]

LOL I know what you mean. My Mini has been acting as a fileserver, webserver, torrentbox, media center and has been converting over 700GB worth of movies from mkv/avi to mp4 for the last like 2 months...poor thing...surprised it hasn't overheated and died by now.

Mine's not quite that bad. Just school work among other things. Combination of a large 70-page paper, a handful of 10 page papers, LOTS of excel spreadsheets for accounting, and a bunch of other stuff. I bet if you put everything I wrote on this computer into one word document you would have a very large novel. I should put it together and sell it has a "3rd-year University Guide to Commerce".
All I got out of this experience is that I need to either buy a desktop, or a series of monitors and a keyboard and mouse. I never want to do that much stuff on a 13'' laptop ever again.

 

[Dalton63841]

Mine's not quite that bad. Just school work among other things. Combination of a large 70-page paper, a handful of 10 page papers, LOTS of excel spreadsheets for accounting, and a bunch of other stuff. I bet if you put everything I wrote on this computer into one word document you would have a very large novel. I should put it together and sell it has a "3rd-year University Guide to Commerce".
All I got out of this experience is that I need to either buy a desktop, or a series of monitors and a keyboard and mouse. I never want to do that much stuff on a 13'' laptop ever again.

LOL Sounds like you have come up with a way make the money to buy a new computer...That book just might be your gateway to a new iMac.