Unable to add events to Calendar

[AndreaM]

MacBook Pro
OS X Yosemite 10.10.3

Today, I am unable to add an event to the Calendar. When I double-click in any of the dates, nothing happens. I tried right-clicking and selecting New event but still nothing. Prior to this, I received a message which said something like "You can't add an event to the Holidays calendar, and the same for the Birthdays calendar when I tried selecting that box. Now both of these options have gone too and I'm left with a calendar that is unusable.

I have noticed strange things happening to other apps too in the last few week. Suddenly, Text Edit changed the way it opened. Before, when I clicked on the icon in the dock, a text document would open. Now it opens a folder, where I have to select a new document. I don't know how to change this back. I notice too when I close a text document which I don't want to keep, instead of saying 'Don't Save' it now says 'Delete'. I don't recall installing an update so have no idea what's happening.

 

[Cory Cooper]

Calendar
-Did you make sure you click on an editable calendar in the list on the left, or is the list of calendars not showing?
-In Calendar > Preferences... what is Default Calendar: set to?

TextEdit
-How recently did you upgrade to Mac OS X 10.10.3 Yosemite? This is the new default way that some Apple apps works, because they are tied to iCloud.

C

 

[AndreaM]

I'm sorry, I only just saw your reply just now.

The problem seems better than it was but, in answer to your question, Default Calendar is set to 'Calendar' (beside it's recognised icon) as that's the only option there is.

 

[honestone]

Not sure if it will help/make any difference, but how come you have not upgraded to last version of Yosemite, OS 10.10.5? If you want, you can get the Combo Updater for 10.10.5 from here:

https://support.apple.com/kb/dl1832?locale=en_US

 

[AndreaM]

I have upgraded to 10.10.5 since my initial post. However, is it worth updating again to El Capitan or are there still considerable problems with it?

 

[honestone]

Not sure which applications you use to make it "compelling" to upgrade. Myself, I mainly upgraded to keep current, but I did use Yosemite the entire time it was the "default" OS. And, I always downloaded and applied the 5 Yosemite updates right away, and thus was using OS 10.10.5 for a number of months.

I would suggest you stick with OS 10.10.5 for "a little while". When you do want to move to El Capitan (OS 10.11.2 is currently in beta testing), you need to prepare your machine for that event. One of the most important things you need to be doing is to make frequent backups. Are you doing that now, and if so, how are you doing it? Hopefully, you are doing it to an external device,

Also, you should clean off any unnecessary stuff from your machine. You should also use some software to check out the health of your hard drive. And finally you will need to get any necessary upgrades for third party software you are using. If you only use Apple software, that step will not be necessary.

 

[AndreaM]

Thanks for your comments honestone. I do back up (reasonably!) regularly to an external drive. I have quite a lot of non-Apple software so perhaps that's what the problem is that I am not installing upgrades. How do I know though when one becomes available and is it necessary to instal those which charge for an upgrade?
Is it okay to just do Repair Disk Permissions in the hope that this cures some of the problems or does that have the potential to cause problems of its own?

 

[honestone]

Glad you are making backups. Do you use Time Machine for that? Time Machine is OK, but using for recovery is somewhat of a "hassle". Now, if you do your backups using a backup/cloning program like either SuperDuper! (it's the one I use), or Carbon Copy Cloner, that is actually better, as such backups are bootable, and thus recovery from a "disaster" is easier.

There are a couple of ways to find out if any updates are available for software you use. A number of them have a "Check For Update" menu item, typically under the first menu "heading" (the one with the name of the program). Some software will notify you of any new updates when you launch it. Then, there is the (previously "OK") site www.macupdate.com. I visit that site a number of times each day. Finally, one can do a google search. (Some software, like the Google Chrome browser, upgrade "themselves").

No matter how you find out about upgrades being available, you really need to download the upgrade itself, and if necessary, apply it. And, download it from the company's/developer's site. You will then have the update on its own file, in case you need it. Do not download anything from the site www.macupdate.com. Just use that site as a reference point. Then, go to the company's/developer's site for the software.

By the way, do you use Office 2011? It is critical to keep that "package" upgraded. I do have it, and have always kept it current (I use Outlook for my EMail, Word, and Excel quite a lot). In fact, that was one I had to wait for the upgrade (now version 14.5.8) before I could move on to El Capitan (the others were SuperDuper!, Onyx, and TechTool Pro).

Additionally, and this was a recent event (and the only time I have ever seen this), the first beta of the OS 10.11.1 update was released in early August, almost two months before OS 10.11 came out at the end of September. So (at least for me), the obvious approach was to wait until OS 10.11.1 was released before upgrading from Yosemite. That is exactly what I did (I actually had to wait anyway for the upgrade to TechTool Pro, which came out about 10 days or so after OS 10.11 was released). Again, that was a rare occurrence, but one needs to be cognizant of such events.

Repairing Disk Permissions is good to use somewhat frequently, but there are other things that might need "fixing" for your drive. Disk Utility also has a "Repair Disk" option, but for the program to do the actual repairs on your internal hard drive, it needs to be launched externally. (There is a (hidden) Recovery HD partition on your drive where one can launch Disk Utility as if it were "external", but it is a slow process. Here is a link that talks about that partition):

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201314

I myself use the excellent disk maintenance/repair program TechTool Pro for performing disk maintenance, cleanup, and (rarely) repairs. (Disk Warrior is another excellent program). And, there is the excellent, and venerable, freeware program Onyx that performs some useful disk cleanup tasks. It can also repair permissions, and I believe does it somewhat beyond Disk Utility. Another good thing about Onyx is that in El Capitan, repair permissions is no longer available in the version of Disk Utility with El Capitan. But, the newest (and El Capitan-specific) version of Onyx has that feature! I have been using it ever since OS 10.11.1 came out, and it works great!

Finally, you should do "manual" cleanup on your own. That is, get rid of unneeded files, folders, etc. I do it very frequently. The best thing to do is to put together a plan of 1) how you do such disk maintenance and/or repairs and backups, 2) what tools to use for that, and 3) how often you do it. Of course, if for example you plan to execute such a plan once a week (like I do), in between you should clean off any unnecessary stuff, like I mentioned above).

 

[AndreaM]

Thanks for your advice. I do use Time Machine. I've also checked that I have all available updates and my Mac is working as before the most recents problems, although Safari is still crashing from time to time.