Bug 2510 – Mac: Drag&Drop of a project file onto Audacity in Apps bar or Finder fails if Audacity is active in the Apps bar

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Audacity 3.0.3 development began 19th April 2021

Audacity Bugzilla

Bug 2510 - Mac: Drag&Drop of a project file onto Audacity in Apps bar or Finder fails if Audacity is active in the Apps bar


Summary:	Mac: Drag&Drop of a project file onto Audacity in Apps bar or Finder fails if...

Status:	RESOLVED FIXED

Product:	Audacity
Classification:	Unclassified
Component:	User Interface
Version:	3.0.0
Hardware:	Mac macOS

Importance:	P3 Repeatable
Assigned To:	Default Assignee for New Bugs

URL:
Keywords:

Depends on:
Blocks:
	Show dependency tree / graph

Reported:	2020-07-28 10:55 UTC by Peter Sampson
Modified:	2021-01-21 15:30 UTC (History)
CC List:	7 users (show)

See Also:	2437
Steps To Reproduce:	1) Launch Audacity 2) Close it 3) Observe it is still active in the Apps bar (black dot or colored bar underneath icon) 4) Drag&Drop a project file onto the icon in the Apps bar or in Finder 5) Observe: Audacity does not launch and open the project, 6) Exit Audacity 7) Right-click on Audacity icon in the Apps bar 8) select "Close" 9) Observe black dot disappears 11) Now Drag&Drop a project file onto the icon in the Apps bar or in Finder 12) Observe: Audacity launches and opens the project
Release Note:	Group: Drag and drop *On Mac Drag&Drop of a project file onto Audacity in Apps bar or Finder fails if Audacity is active in the Apps bar
First Git SHA:
Group:	---
Workaround:	Right click on the Audacity icon in the Apps bar and select "Close" to fully shut down Audacity. Or simply use File > Open to open your project.
Closed:	2021-01-21 00:00:00

Flags:	petersampsonaudacity: Must‑Test‑All‑OS- petersampsonaudacity: Test‑OK‑Win+ petersampsonaudacity: Test‑OK‑Mac+ petersampsonaudacity: Test‑OK‑Lin+

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Description Peter Sampson 2020-07-28 10:55:49 UTC

On Mac Drag&Drop of a project file onto Audacity in Apps bar or Finder fails if Audacity is active in the Apps bar.

This does not affect Win or Linux - Only Mac has this oddity whereby when you exit from Audacity macOS keeps it active/open (for some strange reason) in the Apps bar (BTW this also keeps audacity.cfg open) - the visual cue is the little black dot (or colored bar) underneath the Audacity icon in the Apps bar.

In order to fully shut down Audacity you need to right click on it in the apps bar and select "Close".  The you can drag and drop a project file onto the Apps bar icon or the Audacity app entry in Finder.

This is not a regression as it similarly affects earlier Audacities.

Bit Note that we have enhanced drag&drop functionality for 3.0.0

Comment 1 Peter Sampson 2020-07-28 11:02:10 UTC

This looks like a close cousin of Bug #2437

Comment 2 Leland Lucius 2020-07-30 02:19:52 UTC

I've literally spent 5+ hours on this tonight and have gotten absolutely nowhere.  3.0.0 drag and drop to dock or in Finder works fine in Mojave, but everything I've tried in Catalina has been for naught.

Haven't given up yet, but discouragement is starting to wend it's way in... :-)

Comment 3 Steve Daulton 2020-07-30 05:35:00 UTC

(In reply to Leland Lucius from comment #2)
Google search for "catalina drag and drop" indicates similar problems in many other apps, but I've not found any that are "solved". Perhaps it's not "our problem" at all?

Comment 4 Peter Sampson 2020-07-30 07:05:08 UTC

(In reply to Steve Daulton from comment #3)
Perhaps it's not "our problem" at all?

Indeed

I put this down to one of those odd Mac quirks, knuckle-balls, that Apple loves to throw at us.

I'm going to add a note in the Manual about this - and will downgrade this to P4 (marginal P5).

Comment 5 Peter Sampson 2020-07-30 07:37:44 UTC

(In reply to Peter Sampson from comment #4)
Noted in the alpha  Manual
https://alphamanual.audacityteam.org/man/Importing_Audio#3._Drag_and_drop

Comment 6 Peter Sampson 2021-01-01 10:18:55 UTC

Moving this back up to P3 as we get complaints about this on the Forum - and now on on GitHub:
https://github.com/audacity/audacity/issues/713

Comment 7 Peter Sampson 2021-01-21 15:30:53 UTC

Testing on W10 with Audacity .0.0 b5ee77f

This now works fine for me I can drag an AUP3 project onto
a) active Audacity icon (with sub-dot) on the Apps bar
b) inactive Audacity icon (without sub-dot) on the Apps bar
c) Audacity icon in Finder>Applications

In all three use cases Audacity launches fine and opens the project