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I live in the woods and lose power frequently. When this happens, MacOS tries to restore every application that was open when the power went out. I don't want it to do this. How do i prevent this from happening.

Please note, i am not asking about preventing apps from opening after a restart.

The Head Rush
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  • Would hooking your Mac up to a UPS help avoid this issue completely (I'm assuming you don't have a MacBook of some sort)? A decently sized one could have enough power to keep a Mac running for at least 5-10 minutes. – JW8 Oct 27 '17 at 05:27
  • A UPS screeching would stress my dog. And i'm typically out of the house when the power fails anyway. – The Head Rush Oct 27 '17 at 11:35
  • fair enough. Yeah, unless there was a backup generator that kicked in or a big enough home backup battery, the UPS wouldn't be enough. – JW8 Oct 27 '17 at 16:22
  • Could you possibly create a program that can detect if the computer is turning back on after a power failure, and if it is then close all the apps? Let me know if this is something you’d want. If you do I can put sometime into developing a simple program to do that. – Matthew N Nov 22 '17 at 00:06

2 Answers2

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Hold shift whilst logging in to temporarily disable Resume from re-opening applications.

grg
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  • Isn't this the feature that manages restoring apps after a reboot, not a power failure? – The Head Rush Oct 27 '17 at 11:32
  • Update: this is for reboots, not power interruptions. Still have not found a way to start to a clean desktop after a power failure. – The Head Rush Nov 21 '17 at 23:30
  • @The This should apply to any subsequent login, regardless of how the Mac was shut down and how you were logged out previously. If it’s not working for you that sounds like a bug, what exactly happens when you log in holding shift? – grg Nov 23 '17 at 09:16
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The only thing I'm aware of that will do what you want is disabling ApplePersistence. Unfortunately it has the side effect of disabling versions as well, but perhaps that's a price you're willing to pay.

In Terminal.app, type the following, followed by Enter:

defaults write -g ApplePersistence -bool no

To reverse the setting to its default:

defaults write -g ApplePersistence -bool yes
mjturner
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