Wake up from sleep, Finder always active -- help?

[biggins]

I've got a brand new 13" MacBook Pro with Retina Display, running Mountain Lion (10.8.4). Whenever I put it to sleep (whether by closing the lid or from hitting the power button and selecting "Sleep"), when I wake it back up Finder is the active program, not whatever else was when I put it to sleep. There must be a way to change that.

For example, if I have my browser open and active when I put my computer to sleep, then when I wake it up my browser is still on the screen so I will often try to ctrl-tab to switch tabs or something, only to have nothing happen... and then I realize that, as always, Finder is the active program so I have to cmd-tab back to activate my browser. Does that make sense?

Anyway, it's obviously not the end of the world, but it's annoying, and it would be nice if it could be fixed. Any suggestions? Does anyone else have this problem? Thanks!

 

[oldscribe]

Hi and welcome,

I think I miss something as you say two different things.

Whenever I put it to sleep (whether by closing the lid or from hitting the power button and selecting "Sleep"), when I wake it back up Finder is the active program, not whatever else was when I put it to sleep.There must be a way to change that.

But now you say

if I have my browser open and active when I put my computer to sleep, then when I wake it up my browser is still on the screen

Finder is always active as is depicted by the little light under its dock icon, and as you say re browser for example if you have it running and close the lid. Then when you reopen you will have the same browser page on the screen to when you closed it, this will apply to any program or folder you have open when you close the lid. Be it Aperture, iPhoto pages or any folder on your Mac etc.


So not sure I fully understand your issue.

 

[biggins]

Sorry for the confusion, I think it's a problem of terminology which I don't know since I'm new to Macs. By "active" I mean that it is the program "on top" or the one whose name is in the top left of the menu bar (just to the right of the apple logo). So when I wake my computer up (assuming I don't have any Finder windows open, which is usually the case), then my browser will still be visible on the screen, but the menu at the top will say Finder, and if I hit cmd-n for example a new Finder window will open, not a new browser window. Hope that makes sense?

(If I do have a Finder window open when I put the computer to sleep, that will be visible above my browser when I wake the computer up.)

Thanks for the quick reply!

 

[biggins]

Update: so in reproducing the bug (or whatever it is), I found out that it's not automatically opening *Finder* per se, that's just the most common one that I've noticed. What's actually happening is that it's basically doing a cmd-tab and switching to the most recently used program. So if Finder is the first thing that would come up when I hit cmd-tab then Finder is what will be "active" when I wake my computer up. But if TextEdit would be what a cmd-tab would switch to then TextEdit will be open when I wake my computer up.

tl;dr Sleep/wake up seems to execute an automatic cmd-tab.

 

[oldscribe]

Hi,

By "active" I mean that it is the program "on top" or the one whose name is in the top left of the menu bar (just to the right of the apple logo).

Yes that will be the case, as a test close any program you have running like browsers, iPhoto etc so you just have your desktop with the dock and menu bar, you will now see that finder is always next to the Apple logo, because as I previously said it is always running.
In your words

I found out that it's not automatically opening *Finder* per se, that's just the most common one

As your last post says

What's actually happening is that it's basically doing a cmd-tab and switching to the most recently used program. So if Finder is the first thing that would come up when I hit cmd-tab then Finder is what will be "active" when I wake my computer up. But if TextEdit would be what a cmd-tab would switch to then TextEdit will be open when I wake my computer up.

Or am I still missing something? When you open your Mac it will automatically open any programs that you were running when you closed it.


Therefor if I have say five applications running pages, Numbers, Aperture, Mail and Safari, I then minimise Numbers to the dock Pages, Aperture and Mail in that order but leave Safari on the desktop then close the lid when I reopen Safari will be on the desktop but next to the Apple will be Mail as it was the last application process I activated. If I tap the mouse anywhere on the Safari page it will now become the new application process and its name will be next to the Apple.
Hope this makes sense, can't explain it any other way.

 

[biggins]

Right, so if I open Safari, then Mail, and do stuff in Mail and it is active, then when I put the computer to sleep and wake it up then Safari will be the visible and active program. Basically putting my computer to sleep also does a cmd-tab action for no reason!

(If I only have Safari open and active, then after putting the computer to sleep and waking it up Safari will still be visible because I have no Finder windows open, but the OS will have cmd-tabbed to Finder so that's what it will say next to the Apple logo, since Finder is always running as you say.)

Putting my computer to sleep is literally executing a cmd-tab operation, and I have no idea why.

 

[oldscribe]

Hi,

(If I only have Safari open and active, then after putting the computer to sleep and waking it up Safari will still be visible because I have no Finder windows open, but the OS will have cmd-tabbed to Finder so that's what it will say next to the Apple logo, since Finder is always running as you say.)

No it should wake with Safari active, unless you used another application closed that then closed the lid.
So I fully understand now sorry, resetting the SMC might help, as one area it deals with is the (Responding to the display lid opening and closing) if you have not done this before then have a look here.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3964
As I can not find any settings within system preferences to create what you describe. So if the SMC reset does not help then as this is a new Mac would defiantly take it to your nearest Apple stores Genius Bar and get them to look at it.

 

[biggins]

Ha no worries, it's weird and complicated to explain, thanks for helping me make sure I did so clearly so that others can possibly chip in. I'll try resetting the SMC, thanks!