Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
General Software Troubleshooting Techniques
One of the ongoing mysteries that all Mac users experience at one time or another is what might be called the
now-you-see-it-now-you-don't problem. This gremlin plagues you for a while and then mysteriously vanishes
without any intervention on your part. (It also tends not to occur when you ask your tech-savvy brother-in-law
or someone from the IT department to troubleshoot the problem.) When this happens, most people just shake
their heads and resume working, grateful to no longer have to deal with the problem.
Tracking down the problem
Unfortunately, most computer ills don't just disappear. For more intractable problems, your first order of busi-
ness is to track down the source of the glitch. There's no easy or set way to go about this, but it can be done if
you take a systematic approach. Over the years, I've found that the best approach is to ask a series of questions
designed to gather the required information and/or to narrow down what might be the culprit:
Did you get an error message?
Unfortunately, most computer error messages are obscure and do little to
help you resolve a problem directly. However, error codes and error text can help you down the road, either by
giving you something to search for in an online database or by providing information to a tech support person.
Therefore, you should always write down the full text of any error message that appears.
If the error message is lengthy and you can still use other programs on MacBook Air, don't bother writing down the
full message. Instead, while the message is displayed, press Shift+ +3 to place an image of the current screen on the
desktop. To capture just the error window, press Shift+ +4 instead. If you're worried about losing access to the
desktop, save the image to a flash drive or print it out.
Is there an error message in the Console?
If an error occurs behind the scenes, you don't see anything on-
screen to tell you that something's amiss. However, there's a good chance that MacBook Air made a note of the
error as a Console message. To check, open Launchpad and choose Other →Console. You should check the sys-
tem log by clicking system.log in the Log List; see Figure 11.1. Any message you see is likely to be far too
cryptic for mere mortals to decipher, but it will likely make sense to someone in tech support. You can also
Google the message text to see if a solution appears online.
