Solving contextual menu issues

Various issues can appear with contextual menus under Mac OS X 10.4.x, including duplication of items, failure or menus to load, distorted menu text, and more.

MacFixIt reader Stephen Schwerdfeger describes a typical case that appeared after a Security Update:

"I am running Mac OS X 10.4.2 and have delayed installing latest security fix to see what issues arise from it; and now all my contextual menus are duplicating items, i.e. every item in a contextual menu appears twice. Can't seem to figure out why."

While the reasons for these issues occurring after a major system update (such as, in Stephen's case, a Security Update) are many, they usually involve corruption of a system cache. As such, there are a few workarounds:

• First, temporarily remove all third-party contextual menu plugins from ~/Library/Contextual Menu Items (move them to the desktop or another folder outside of the Library directory) and restart. Check for persistence of the issue. If the issue subsides, add each item back one-by-one until you discover the errant plug-in.
• Try deleting the file com.apple.LaunchServices.6B.csstore located at /Library/Caches/ and log out then back in.
• Finally, try deleting the file com.apple.finder.plist from ~/Library/Preferences/, again logging out then back in. You may need to restore various settings after deleting this file.

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