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Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

annoying.technology

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Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#111

Post by gingerlime »

mstade wrote: post #54

I don't have any issues with Apple Mail but I do have issues with zoom, randomly switching from full screen sharing to the desktop and back again, it's incredibly annoying. It doesn't happen when I share my screen, only when others do. It seems to have gotten better recently but still happens in occasion. Anyone else seeing this? Maybe it's related?

I have another zoom problem on Mojave. Even though I marked the zoom windows to use Desktop 2, they keep opening on Desktop 1 :-/ any tips on how to fix this?

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#112

Post by PunksATawnyFill »

chrisseaton wrote: post #26
Austin_Conlon wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't say for Mail, but in my experience watchOS and SwiftUI reports are frequently acknowledged.

Apple definitely has a history of not acknowledging for a long time major problems that many people can clearly demonstrate. Bend gate, antenna gate, stage light gate, that thing with the coating on the screens...

Flexgate is still a real, profound, and disgraceful defect.

This is the one where your MacBook Pro’s screen stops working because Apple ran a ribbon cable through a hinge or some such stupid shit. Been happening since 2016 and still rendering $4000 laptops useless after 18 months of light use.

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#113

Post by derefr »

evanelias wrote: post #98
vladharbuz wrote: post #55

I've had this issue for the past 2–3 years. It seems to happen because of improper error handling. If you look closely at the app in the instant it opens, your affected account will have a “disconnected” symbol next to it in the sidebar. However, it goes away before an error can be shown. My theory is: there is a momentary connection issue with these G Suite accounts, and Mail.app starts to show an error by focusing…

In my experience, if you always hide the Mail window (cmd-h) instead of closing it (cmd-w), it won't ever pop back up. Takes a while to retrain the muscle memory though! I haven't tested this in Catalina, but it definitely works consistently in Mojave.

Mind you, a program with “hidden” windows open takes up more CPU/memory than a program without any windows open, because the view-controllers for those windows are still running, just bound to an invisible, non-updating view. (Though, admittedly, it’s less of a CPU cost than minimizing the window, since that requires the view to be kept active too, to facilitate updating the live thumbnail.)

The main place this comes up is in cases where the main window is doing something clever to gather the information to display itself. For example, Activity Monitor doesn’t suddenly stop using half your CPU when you hide it.

Mail.app probably keeps a big scrollable list-control for the selected view in-memory for as long as you have the window open. So it might be a bad idea to do this if you’re one of those people who never archive anything (i.e. practice “Inbox Infinity.”)

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#114

Post by nottorp »

brandonhorst wrote: post #85

You can fix this by removing the “Google” account and connecting to Gmail as a regular IMAP account. Since I did that, I haven’t had any issues with this.

Oh, I was wondering why I don't have that issue. I've set up Apple Mail long before they had specific support for "google" accounts so of course the gmail account is imap...

Btw 7 years of importing application configuration across OS installs without a hitch.

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#115

Post by tannhaeuser »

snuxoll wrote: post #97
lonelappde wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This smells like a feature built 10+ years ago, before notifications existed in Mac OS X, that never got upgraded. That's how apps "notified" back then.

> That's how apps "notified" back then. Polite apps would just bounce their dock icon rather than stealing focus, however.

Exactly. I found the bouncing animation genius, as it always reminded me of a toddler impatiently jumping up and down for attention. Doesn't mail.app do this?

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#117

Post by saagarjha »

snuxoll wrote: post #97
lonelappde wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This smells like a feature built 10+ years ago, before notifications existed in Mac OS X, that never got upgraded. That's how apps "notified" back then.

> That's how apps "notified" back then. Polite apps would just bounce their dock icon rather than stealing focus, however.

I wrote a SIMBL plugin at one point to neuter applications that did this too much (actually, I forked it from someone who wrote it for Spotify). Trying to grab my attention in a persistent, repetitive way for something that is minor drives me up the wall.

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#118

Post by saagarjha »

derefr wrote: post #113
evanelias wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience, if you always hide the Mail window (cmd-h) instead of closing it (cmd-w), it won't ever pop back up. Takes a while to retrain the muscle memory though! I haven't tested this in Catalina, but it definitely works consistently in Mojave.

Mind you, a program with “hidden” windows open takes up more CPU/memory than a program without any windows open, because the view-controllers for those windows are still running, just bound to an invisible, non-updating view. (Though, admittedly, it’s less of a CPU cost than minimizing the window, since that requires the view to be kept active too, to facilitate updating the live thumbnail.) The main place this comes…

> Though, admittedly, it’s less of a CPU cost than minimizing the window, since that requires the view to be kept active too, to facilitate updating the live thumbnail.

I thought that was a static thumbnail?

> For example, Activity Monitor doesn’t suddenly stop using half your CPU when you hide it.

It does for me, which is why I keep it hidden when I’m not actively using it.

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#119

Post by Nextgrid »

defnotashton2 wrote: post #100

Reading the people that put up with it why? What's wrong with thunderbird?

Mac Mail supports the Exchange proprietary HTTP API, while all the other clients only support IMAP. HTTP is much more efficient and seems more resilient against temporary network issues (due to the lack of a persistent connection).

Re: Apple Mail randomly becomes the frontmost application in macOS

#120

Post by saagarjha »

bambataa wrote: post #58
galad87 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason is that Mail thinks the mail server is unreachable, so it brings the window to front, but then magically it changes idea and the mail server is reachable again ️.

In general I find macOS handles alerting the user very poorly. I don't know why but it infuriates me when icons bounce on the dock for attention. The animation is too insistent for whatever trivial thing the app wants to let me know. Or an app will open some Important Dialog Box that I need to deal with, except it's hidden behind some other windows somewhere and the rest of the app refuses to respond to my clicks unt…

> I don't know why but it infuriates me when icons bounce on the dock for attention. The animation is too insistent for whatever trivial thing the app wants to let me know.

The animation is fine, it’s just that bad app developers abuse it for the most trivial things. I’m looking at you, Music.app and Microsoft AutoUpdate.app. (“You’re playing music elsewhere” for the former, which I am not but thanks for suggesting I’m trying to be a pirate; “I finished one part of a multi-part update and automatically continued” for the latter.)

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