Hotkeys don't work until Alfred restarts

[IrishLionPlatter]

Running MacOS 10.14.3 and Alfred 3.8.1

 

I have Alfred as a login item, if that makes  a difference.

 

The main Alfred hotkey CMD-Space always works. But all the other hotkeys (clipboard, workflow, etc.) do not work until I restart Alfred.

[deanishe]

Hi @IrishLionPlatter, welcome to the forum.

 

Do you perhaps have any other software running that changes the way your keyboard behaves (e.g. Karabiner or keyboard drivers)?

[IrishLionPlatter]

Nothing like it. 

[Vero]

@IrishLionPlatter It's very likely @deanishe is pointing you in the right direction here; This is a fairly unusual issue, and when it crops up, it's usually caused by third-party apps interfering in some way.

• First, could you give us some examples of the hotkey combinations you're having issues with?
• Do you use a standard Mac keyboard, or any third-party hardware?
• At what point do the hotkeys stop responding if they work when you first restart Alfred? Are there any other apps being launched?
• And finally, if you create a new user account on your Mac temporarily, and install Alfred on this vanilla account, do you see normal behaviour with these hotkeys?

The more information you're able to provide about your particular situation, the more likely we'll be able to help you troubleshoot this

 

Cheers,
Vero

 

 

[IrishLionPlatter]

Hi, Vero.

 

some hotkey combo examples:

CMD-OPTION-V or CONTROL-OPTION-SHIFT-S

 

I'm using a standard US keyboard.

The hotkeys do not work only right after the system restart. Alfred is a login item. So, I just have to restart Alfred, after the system restart. Then no problems.

Checked all the other login item apps and their keyboard shortcuts. Nothing seems to be interfering.

 

Haven't tried creating a dummy account yet.

 

Thanks.

[Andrew]

@IrishLionPlatter Do you have your Application Support folder on an external disk, or a network drive, or 3rd party synced in some way.

 

I'm thinking that at the point Alfred starts, it doesn't have access to the Application Support data, which means that no Powerpack details can be found so it's started as a non-Powerpack version. Restarting Alfred at some point after the data is available will start with the Powerpack active.

 

Cheers,

Andrew

[IrishLionPlatter]

Andrew. That sounds logical.

I wonder if this is because I have the Alfred preferences store on a Google Drive to be shared between multiple machines.

 

Is there a remedy here where I can still keep Alfred as a login item and keep the preferences on GD?

[deanishe]

Based on your issue, I'd guess you're using the Google Drive Filesystem app.

 

1 hour ago, IrishLionPlatter said:

Is there a remedy here where I can still keep Alfred as a login item and keep the preferences on GD?

 

If my above guess is right, you can improve the situation by using the "regular" Google Drive app.

 

GDFS causes all manner of issues with Alfred and the (Spotlight) metadata index it uses because GDFS files aren't "real" files. It's a half-baked virtual filesystem.

 

Edited April 26, 2019 by deanishe