Dock issue with macOS 27 Golden Gate...

First report that I've seen on this issue, but there have been a couple of other issues reported for the Dock and several with Spaces/Mission Control.

Some have been resolved by identifying and removing incompatible 3rd party extensions, others are bona fide bugs. 

There have been many issues reported with Mission Control and Spaces on macOS 27 Golden Gate, especially regarding the way Full Screen apps and app switching are handled. Some have been resolved by identifying and removing incompatible 3rd party extensions, others are bona fide bugs. 

Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support

If that does not correct the issue, test in a new user account. A newly-created user account will have all settings at default, and if the issue does not occur in that new account then it provides guidance on what may need to be changed to correct the issue.

Add a user or group on Mac - Apple Support

Once the testing is complete, the new account can easily be deleted.

Delete a user or group on Mac – Apple Support

Those steps will help to isolate the problem.

It might help to download and run EtreCheck, written by a long-time forum member. The free version is fine. Post the full report using the Additional Text button. No personal information is revealed. 

If the issue persists in safe mode and a new user account, that suggests that it's a bug that Apple needs to address. Bugs can be reported to Apple here:

Feedback - macOS - Apple

Reporting issues like this to Apple is the only way to get them fixed. They do prioritize bugs based on frequency of reports, so the more people who report it, the faster it will be addressed.

elliottandrews wrote:

My Etrecheck. Please let me know what you see, if anything?

Indeed. What I see jumping out is:

[Loaded] CleanMyMac_5_FinderSyncExtension - /Applications/CleanMyMac_5.app

Many long-time forum members unaffectionately refer to that piece of crapware as BrickMyMac, because of the many (many!!) times over the years we have seen the problems it causes. Some approach catastrophic, but many are like what you are experiencing – insidious, apparently unrelated problems after an update to macOS. To be honest, I am not at all surprised to see that in your report...

If you have 3rd party ‘protection’ software installed, that often causes those types of problems. That includes:

• Cleaners (software claiming to automatically free up space)
• Optimizers (software claiming to make your Mac run faster)
• Antivirus software
• VPN software (unless provided by a school/employer to enable access to internal resources from a remote location)

Such 3rd party system ‘helpers’, ‘cleaners’ and ‘protectors’ do more harm than good. In fact, such products are completely unnecessary for macOS and the only ‘good’ (if you want to call it that) they do is to put money in the developers’ pockets. Cleaners and protectors cause compatibility issues, often after macOS updates. Commercial VPNs claim to hide your browsing activity from websites, and while that may be true those VPN providers just sell your browsing data to others. For the user, all of these types of software offer only harm…and if that is limited to harm to your bank account, then count yourself lucky. If you have installed such software, follow the developer’s instructions to completely uninstall it (note that some developers fail to provide instructions and their software installs can be pervasive, meaning the only way to truly remove it is to erase your Mac, reinstall macOS then restore your user files from a backup).

I had the same experience tonight with "Dock Helper"... Dock had behaved correctly for the past two days with no freezes but it came back tonight... No keyboard access so I could not run commands to restart the Dock or the Finder... I did "Relaunch Finder" multiple times... Then I opened Activity Monitor and as Big_Penquin suggested, I found the process "DockHelper was "not responding"... I tried to QUIT that process but that did not work. However, it also offered a FORCE QUIT option so I subsequently tried that and it worked... See picture... It fixed the Dock... Shortly afterward, it froze again (no Dock freeze for two days and then two times in 10 minutes)... Force Quit that process again and it recovered the Dock again... And my keyboard was restored, thus I was able to type and post this note. Problem lives on... Just reporting...

elliottandrews wrote:

It happened after the update, I had no issues with any of the previous OSs, so that makes it an update issue I am afraid.

I have Stacks-using folders in my Dock, and I've never experienced a freeze or beachballing associated with them (or for any other reason) on macOS 27.0 or 27.0.1, both of which I upgraded/updated to the day they launched. If it's an update issue, why don't I see it? Why aren't there more a handful of reports about it?

It's far more likely that it's a problem specific to your system. That you still see the issue in safe mode is an important piece of the puzzle. Since neither of the two people affected by this issue seem willing to post an EtreCheck report, one thing you might want to try is running Apple Diagnostics.

Use Apple Diagnostics to test your Mac - Apple Support

The last time I had an issue with recurring freezes and beachballing was about 5 years ago on my work Mac, then a 16" Core i9 MBP. I would see the problems when running and actively using Microsoft Teams, regardless of what else was running on the Mac (even if Teams was the only active app). I suffered with it for a while (cursing Microsoft the whole time), but it turned out the real problem was a failing RAM module.

I have the same issue too. But I don’t think it’s got anything to do with CleanMyMac. I work with five different Macs, two MacBookAir (M1 and M3), one MacBookPro (M2 Max), an iMac (M1) and a Mac Studio (M1 Ultra). Only one of them has the same problem, the iMac, whereas the other four work perfectly. And ... tatata ... all of them are running with CleanMyMac. We can discuss a lot about the purpose and objective of such a tool, and in the end, it's definitely too expensive. But sometimes it's also convenient 😉

But I made another observation: Whenever I double-click the trash, it always takes an unusually long time for the files inside to appear. That happens every single time. I see the ‘Loading…’ message every time. Perhaps it is a problem with the file system after all? And, of course, keyboard input for apps isn’t working for me either (I'm noch quite sure, where this phenomenon was discussed here or in another post).

However, I may have found a workaround: I can use Spotlight (keyboard input works there!) to navigate to the Activity Monitor. There’s a process in there – Dock Helper – which is frozen. When I quit it (‘Quit Now…’), the dock starts working properly again.

Dock becomes unresponsive after clicking Applications > Utilities in the Dock

I have a newly purchased Mac Studio with an M5 Max chip, 64 GB of unified memory, and a 512 GB SSD. I performed a clean installation of macOS 27.0.1.

After adding the Applications folder to the Dock and setting its view mode to List, I encountered the following issue: when I click Applications > Utilities in the Dock with my mouse, the Dock stops responding and the spinning rainbow cursor appears.

In Activity Monitor, DockHelper shows as Not Responding. Restarting the Dock with killall Dock temporarily restores it, but the issue occurs again from time to time.

I recorded a short video demonstrating the situation:

https://youtu.be/gI6sQqq6FSg

Hey guys, I just performed the same test on several desktop Macs in Apple Store and now I can tell it's a Dock issue on macOS 27.

On macOS 27, adding the Applications folder to the Dock and setting its view mode to List causes a reproducible Dock freeze. Clicking Applications and then attempting to open Utilities makes the Dock unresponsive and displays the spinning rainbow wheel (beach ball).

I reproduced this issue on my newly purchased Mac Studio with M5 Max, 64 GB of unified memory, and a 512 GB SSD after performing a clean installation of macOS 27.0.1.

To verify that this is not specific to my Mac, I tested four current desktop Macs at the Apple Store in Taipei 101: Mac Studio with M5 Max, Mac mini with M6, Mac mini with M5 Pro, and iMac with M4. I added the Applications folder to the Dock, set its view mode to List, clicked Applications, and attempted to open Utilities.

All four Macs reproduced the same issue: the Dock froze and displayed the spinning rainbow wheel.

This appears to be a macOS 27 Dock/Stack-related issue rather than a hardware-specific problem, as it occurs across multiple Mac models and Apple silicon generations. However, this issue wasn't reproduced on MacBook Air with M5, macOS 27.0 and MacBook Pro with M5 series in Apple Store.

Reproduction steps:

1. Add the Applications folder to the Dock.
2. Set the folder’s view mode to List.
3. Click Applications in the Dock.
4. Attempt to open the Utilities folder.
5. The Dock becomes unresponsive and displays the spinning rainbow cursor.

Affected systems observed:

• Mac Studio with M5 Max, macOS 27.0.1
• Mac mini with M6, macOS 27.0
• Mac mini with M5 Pro, macOS 27.0
• iMac with M4, macOS 27.0

Video evidence (on YouTube)

• My newly purchased Mac Studio M5 Max with Dock not responding in macOS 27.0.1:
• https://youtu.be/gI6sQqq6FSg
• Mac mini M5 Pro: Dock not responding (macOS 27.0):
• https://youtube.com/shorts/sPmMH7r9uO8?feature=share
• iMac M4: Dock not responding (macOS 27.0):
• https://youtube.com/shorts/8SGyKKGrQfM?feature=share
• Mac mini M6: Dock not responding (macOS 27.0):
• https://youtube.com/shorts/705sGNVCsDw?feature=share
• Mac Studio M5 Max: Dock not responding (macOS 27.0):
• https://youtube.com/shorts/Mejdb5i137M?feature=share

Expected behavior: Clicking Applications > Utilities in a Dock folder set to List view should open the Utilities folder normally. The Dock should remain responsive.

Actual behavior: The Dock freezes, becomes unresponsive, and displays the spinning rainbow wheel. In Activity Monitor, DockHelper may show as Not Responding.

Per neuroanatomist above, you might want to start in SAFE mode and run there for a long enough time to see if the issue stays away... My issue is that I can run all day as I have today and get no DOCK issues... But then, like last night, I get two events within 20 minutes... Then nothing for a day or even days... Tougher to analyze when it doesn't happen often... I have started in SAFE mode but haven't yet chosen to run in that mode for hours yet...

Interesting ... Just did a Google AI search on "DockHelper"... Beyond my pay grade but I will go study what it says... All I can report is when my Dock froze yesterday, that one process, DockHelper, showed up in RED on Activity Monitor as "not responding". When I Force Quit that process (Quit didn't work but Force Quit did) my Dock unfroze without me having to kill the issue by rebooting...

That said, Activity Monitor was open and minimized at the time (luck) and I was able to reopen it from the otherwise frozen Dock, saying I think that far right section of the Dock (beyond the section divider) might have still been active...??? And from there I was able to Force Quit "DockHelper". One could say I could also open Activity Monitor by nesting down from the hard drive but even that was not available in the 2nd of two freezes last night as the frozen screen was covering where my Macintosh HD sits... So certainly not some great solution. Again, just reporting ...

I've sent feedback to Apple now twice regarding this issue, with the 2nd submission including my own observations about DockHelper becoming unresponsive when this issue occurs... If I can open Activity Monitor and quit that DockHelper process, then the Dock issue ceases to be until it happens again later...

Well blow me down - 27.2 fixed the issue - So it was the Golden Gate update after all and whatever has gone into and on with 27.2 fixed it. Might get CleanMyMac back on my Mac after all that.

elliottandrews wrote:

Golden Gate issue.

There are 10-15 million Macs running Golden Gate at this point. Two people are reporting this problem. That strongly indicates that the problem is some incompatible extension or 3rd party software installed on your Macs, or a corrupted preference file. Thus the suggestions for safe mode, a new user account, and an EtreCheck report posted here.

My Etrecheck. Please let me know what you see, if anything?

Thanks!

This would be very useful to relay back to Apple via their Feedback website,

Product Feedback - Apple

When that link opens, you'd have to hunt a bit but down in "macOS Apps" you will find (buried in a lot of other choices), this choice....

macOS

When you later fill out details it will ask you for a specific macOS and there you would choose Golden Gate 27 or 27.0.1 or whatever...

Just a heads up in case you have time and would choose to let Apple know what you've observed... thanks...

There is another post on this topic, also started by me... Don't recall how I ended up with two... But you might want to check out some of the response offered by "Owl-53"... He has a lot of things to offer, including Terminal commands one can use to kill the Dock or kill the Finder... I was planning to go try those commands next when I just learned I have no keyboard either when this issue occurs... But he offers other thoughts as well...

See that other post here...

Stacks are freezing and forcing a reboot … - Apple Community

elliottandrews wrote:

It happens for me in safe mode which is what makes me believe it’s an update issue, I don’t have any third party apps running as far as I am aware.

An issue affecting a handful out of millions of users is not ‘an update issue’.

One common cause of freezing / beachballing is insufficient free space on your internal drive.

Six days after I reported this issue above, it's still an issue... Only happens maybe once a day or so... I use the folders to the right of the "dividing line" in my dock all the time... As shortcuts to tons of other folders and files within... Though for a time it might have to do with me reaching up quite high on the screen, even off the top of the screen to grab say some folder but no... Today, I was about to highlight a folder that barely rises above the dock when it went into the frozen spinning gear... That normally locks the entire dock from further use but today I did (as I've done before) asked to "relaunch the finder" and it DID... Recovered my use of the Dock except it left behind a picture, if you will, of what had previously been frozen just above the main dock... That was in one of my six Screens I use and if was as though I had fixed the problem, for the moment, except that "picture" just continued to sit on screen 2... And if I moved my mouse into that small picture, it would again show the spinning gear... So I logged off and back on to get back to a normal screen... Gonna try to figure out how to describe and send apple feedback now... Doesn't happen often... Maybe like once every 50 or so openings of a floating window above the dock... anyone else??? thanks...

thanks for the quick response... I had heard about issues with Spaces and Mission Control.. I use both extensively and so far they've worked fine for me... It's just this dock issue... I thought I'd start here on the Discussion forum... I do know how to start in SAFE mode... Good idea to try that. And I have EtrCheckPro... forgot about that. thanks for the reminder... I'm gonna try to see if there is something about how I move my mouse and drag up into that opened folders area above the Dock that causes that part of the system to hang... So far I would guess it's random but perhaps it's something I can figure out and change... We will see... And if it continues I will send a bug report to Apple.. Done that before... thanks again for your help... Much appreciated...

No... Keyboard still works... And even the Dock becomes useable again but whatever "Stack" window I had open that was floating above the Dock now just sits there... And if I move my mouse into that area (of the Stack window) the cursor breaks into the spinning gear...

I stand corrected... I was asked the other day if my keyboard stopped working when I get the spinning beachball on Stacks above the Dock... I said no.... That was wrong... Had it happen again today and this time I checked again... No ability to use the keyboard on anything... Not in a text doc... Not in an Excel Spreadsheet... No keyboard just like you reported when the Dock locks up... Sorry for offering the wrong answer before...

How much free space is enough??? I have a 1 TB drive that is getting sort of full... Says it is 994 GByte in size and that I have 890.5 used... Still 10% remaining...

And I do have an Etrecheck but want to look it over and have not had time. Not that I claim I will understand it all that well... And next time this happens I intend to dive into Activity monitor and perhaps look at say the system.log???

Robert Paris wrote:

Problem lives on... Just reporting...

And you still remain somehow convinced that the problem lives on but has absolutely nothing to do with the 'protection' software to which you alluded having on your Mac in your other thread on this issue. Okay.

I have never said anything of the kind!!!! Not convinced about anything other than I and a few others have this issue that clearly showed up the day I upgraded to Golden Gate. But I have no idea what is actually causing the issue and I certainly still have on my list of possibilities the use of Net Barrier or Virus Barrier... As I said in my newest post, "just reporting"... Not "assuming" anything... Just putting out what might be useful information (DockHelper not responding) to the community in case it might those having the issue to fix it... Short of wiping hard drives and starting over...

Again, just to report a further observation, when things are operating normally, meaning no frozen dock, the process I showed above, DockHelper, is not even an active, running process... See attached a current snapshot of the only two processes currently running that start with "dock", one called "Dock" and one called "Dock Extra" but no "DockHelper"... Not sure what that means but again, just reporting an observation....

Robert Paris wrote:

Again, just to report a further observation, when things are operating normally, meaning no frozen dock, the process I showed above, DockHelper, is not even an active, running process... See attached a current snapshot of the only two processes currently running that start with "dock", one called "Dock" and one called "Dock Extra" but no "DockHelper"...

Conversely, I have never had a Dock-related freeze on my M4 Pro MBP, and I see both DockHelper and Dock Extra running.

I too am having this issue. I reinstalled Golden Gate from Safe Mode, I thought it had helped but it has come back today.

Does your keyboard also stop working when it locks out?

Interesting. Annoying for me as I can’t even run the kill dock command in terminal because my keyboard is not functioning.

Hopefully there’s a fix soon!

Thank you for confirming! Same issue then. What could it be?! Golden Gate issue. Please let me know if you find a fix.

The kill commands are a good idea except you can’t enter them when the keyboard is locked out.

It happens for me in safe mode which is what makes me believe it’s an update issue.

It happens for me in safe mode which is what makes me believe it’s an update issue, I don’t have any third party apps running as far as I am aware.

It happened after the update, I had no issues with any of the previous OSs, so that makes it an update issue I am afraid.

I have 600 gb free on my internal drive so it’s not that, good idea though.

I've cleared my M4 MAX MBP of all of the Clean My Mac stuff, and I am getting the dock freeze conversely still.

But now, with no Dock issues at the moment, DockHelper is up and running with no issues... Picture...

Well that is interesting! Nothing to do with CleanMyMac after all.

Thanks for proving it was indeed a Golden Gate issue, as expected :)