Alfred interferes with Microsoft Remote Desktop connections

[hroe]

I use Microsoft Remote Desktop v10.2.3 downloaded from the Mac App Store to connect to a server at work.

 

The following is repeatable behavior:

- If Alfred 3 is not running, my Remote Desktop sessions work fine.

- If Alfred 3 is running, I can launch a Remote Desktop session and perform a single user interface operation and then Remote Desktop hangs. (I can then force quit RD and re-launch and the UI operation will have completed.)

 

I am currently on Mojave v10.14.1 and Alfred v3.7. However, in retrospect this behavior has been going on for months (since at least June 2018 and the prior version of OS X) and we only just tracked down the conflict today. (We had been doing workarounds of using RD in a separate user account.)

 

This is truly bizarre (but completely replicable) behavior that Alfred is some how interfering with RD's connections or causing RD to lose its connection. 

 

I'm happy to try to provide any additional information or run tests that might be useful to tracking down how Alfred is conflicting with Microsoft Remote Desktop.

 

Thanks! 

-Henry Roe

 

Edited June 22, 2022 by vitor
Edited title to not mention v3 specifically, due to comment further down

[Vero]

@hroe At idle, Alfred isn't doing anything network-related or that could interfere with your Remote Desktop session.  

 

The only consideration is whether you've got Alfred Remote enabled, which you may want to try disabling. Alfred Remote uses standard APIs and doesn't do anything unusual, but it's possible that Microsoft Remote Desktop is taking issue with something here.

 

Next time Microsoft Remote Desktop hangs, try the following:

• Launch Activity Monitor. select Remote Desktop and choose "Sample Process" from under the cog at the top of Activity Monitor
• Launch Console.app for any error messages that might provide insight into what's causing it to hang

If there's anything interesting, share the output of what Console/Activity Monitor report.

 

43 minutes ago, hroe said:

I'm happy to try to provide any additional information or run tests that might be useful to tracking down how Alfred is conflicting with Microsoft Remote Desktop.

 

Take a look at the information I suggested above, and report this to Microsoft as they may be able to help you establish what could be happening to Remote Desktop.

 

[Moved out of the Bugs section and into Discussion and Help]

 

Cheers,
Vero

[kisonay]

I've come across the following thread here in the forums that is the exact issue I am having: 

 

TLDR: Microsoft Remote Desktop will freeze randomly when Alfred is running. The above thread indicates it is a network issue but in my troubleshooting, I've noticed that I only experience the issue when I have clipboard history active. I've gone ahead and added Microsoft Remote Desktop to the exclude/ignore list but it doesn't seem to help.

 

Has anyone experienced this or something similar and are there any workarounds? One of the many reasons I purchased powerpack was for the clipboard history.

 

 

 

[vitor]

2 hours ago, kisonay said:

The above thread indicates it is a network issue

It says the opposite; that it is unlikely to be the reason.

 

2 hours ago, kisonay said:

I've noticed that I only experience the issue when I have clipboard history active.

How does Microsoft Remote Desktop usually handles the clipboard? Is it synced?

 

2 hours ago, kisonay said:

Has anyone experienced this or something similar and are there any workarounds?

New posts make that harder to track, so I’ll merge them. I’ve edited the thread’s title to not mention a specific version.

 

Also, please provide the requested debugging information, as well as your exact versions of Alfred, macOS, and Microsoft Remote Desktop.

 

Edited June 22, 2022 by vitor
Mention thread title edit to remove specific version

[kisonay]

Thanks @vitor, and I apologize for creating a new post.

Perhaps I miss-spoke, the initial poster indicated that it was network related, as they never responded to say otherwise, I went with it and added my experience.

 

Yes, Microsoft Remote Desktop does allow you to copy and paste between the remote session and the host machine. I see no way of changing this in MRD Preferences (just for debugging purposes.)

 

I'm using the latest version of everything: mac OS 12.4, Afred 4.6.6 and MRD 10.7.6 I have even tried with the latest beta version of Remote Desktop with the same results.

 

As for activity monitor and what it knows about the situation, I can share the sample process if needed. I also don't see anything meaningful (to me) in the console.

Edited June 22, 2022 by kisonay

[vitor]

The clipboard insight is a good one. This may be caused by a race condition on Microsoft’s Remote Desktop part where they mark the data as accessible and try to process it before it truly is ready, causing the hang when it’s requested.

I’ve found other reports of problematic interactions between Remote Desktop and other apps, with the clipboard being the common issue. On “Mac OS Remote Desktop Client freezes on interaction with Slack”, there is a comment pointing out how to disable the clipboard feature on Remote Desktop.