Subscribe to
Posts
Comments
NSLog(); Header Image

Spaces/Sheet Bug in Leopard

In using MarsEdit, I noticed what I at first thought was a bug in MarsEdit, but which turns out to be a bug or a usability flaw in Mac OS X 10.5 regarding Spaces.

I contacted Daniel Jalkut, and he put together a test application (TestSpaces) that displays the behavior simply:

  1. Open a TextEdit window in Space 1.
  2. In Space 2, open the TestSpaces app.
  3. Click the button in the TestSpaces app, then switch to Space 1 and type some characters in your TextEdit document.
  4. When the TestSpaces sheet automatically closes itself, you're automatically taken back to Space 2.
  5. Type some more characters, then switch back to Space 1. Note that what you typed appears in TextEdit - which wasn't even in the space you were looking at when you typed them!

Needless to say, this is a problem. At least two things are wrong here:

  1. When I switch away from an application, the closing of a sheet should not be enough to bring me back to its Space.
  2. When I'm looking at a space, the key window should not be in another space.

I've filed a bug report (#5574819).

6 Responses to "Spaces/Sheet Bug in Leopard"

  1. [...] one way in which it sort of behaves awkwardly with MarsEdit. Fortunately, one of my customers noticed the problem and dropped me a line. I did some research and discovered what I believe to be the following [...]

  2. I've seen similar behavior in other applications. It's especially annoying with VMware running full screen in one space and Windows puts up an alert while you're in a different space. It will switch to the VMware space and back to the original space. One time it just kept switching back & forth quickly between two spaces when that happened.

  3. Marked as duplicate of #5479476.

  4. [...] course, I'd have to add to the list a clarification that actions like the automatic closing of a sheet should not take you back to another space, [...]

  5. [...] one way in which it sort of behaves awkwardly with MarsEdit. Fortunately, one of my customers noticed the problem and dropped me a line. I did some research and discovered what I believe to be the following [...]

  6. [...] I just noticed that this bug - a bug that affected sheets and Spaces in Mac OS X - appears to be fixed in Snow [...]