Opening Applications folder launches installers

[MetricHours]

Posting for a newbie friend who's got the weirdest problem I've ever seen. Opening the Applications folder on his MacBook causes two installers to launch and run automatically. One is for ProTools, the other is for Adobe Flash Player. Both apps have already been installed.

There are no Folder Actions assigned to the Applications folder, and I can't think of anything else that could be causing this to happen.

The installers don't appear in the Force Quit Applications box. Force-Quitting Finder is the only way I've found out of letting the installers run, but when Finder relaunches, the Applications folder window doesn't stay open, so this puts me back where I started.

He's using 10.9.5. Thanks for any help!

 

[Taz Mangus]

Posting for a newbie friend who's got the weirdest problem I've ever seen. Opening the Applications folder on his MacBook causes two installers to launch and run automatically. One is for ProTools, the other is for Adobe Flash Player. Both apps have already been installed.

There are no Folder Actions assigned to the Applications folder, and I can't think of anything else that could be causing this to happen.

The installers don't appear in the Force Quit Applications box. Force-Quitting Finder is the only way I've found out of letting the installers run, but when Finder relaunches, the Applications folder window doesn't stay open, so this puts me back where I started.

He's using 10.9.5. Thanks for any help!

Try this: Open the Disk Utility application in the Utilities folder, select the name of your hard drive (Macintosh HD?) and press the Repair Permissions. Reboot and see if this helps.

 

[DeltaMac]

I can't think of a simple reason that any app would launch automatically, simply by opening the Applications folder.

When you open the Applications folder, do the errant installers mount as folders on the desktop first?

Check in the Applications folder.
Are the installer apps or image files for those two apps in the Applications folder - and not just the apps that are installed?
(you are looking for either .dmg or installer .pkg files ? )

Moving any .dmg or installer package files out of your Applications folder would likely fix that issue.

 

[MetricHours]

I passed your advice on to my friend, along with a recommendation that he download a decent search utility such as Find Any File so he can pull stuff out of a folder without opening the folder in the Finder. He hasn't gotten back to me yet, but in the meantime I just want to thank you both for your advice.