Safari, iChat won't launch

Need advice, can't launch Safari or iChat.

This started after I was trying to do a secure erase on an external
firewire hard drive.

I think Disk Utility hung because the progress bar wasn't advancing
after an hour and it never completed the process. So I had to do a Force
Quit of Disk Utility.

Thereafter, I've had problems with doing a normal Restart. That now
seems OK after a Force Restart and a couple of tries.

But what is still a problem is Safari and iChat won't launch either from
the dock or from their location. They either show the arrow below their
icon in the dock or they do the bouncing thing but they don't launch.

Any advice as how to repair. I've run DU and Disk Warrior but all was OK
and still doing it.

Thanks for any advice.

PS Safari just launched after bouncing for about 5 minutes, iChat still
with an arrow below it and not launching. And when I tried to quit and
launch Safari, it again wouldn't launch.

--
Please send email to: nwhiii at yahoo dot com

In article ,
Norm wrote:

> Need advice, can't launch Safari or iChat.
>
> This started after I was trying to do a secure erase on an external
> firewire hard drive.
>
> I think Disk Utility hung because the progress bar wasn't advancing
> after an hour and it never completed the process. So I had to do a Force
> Quit of Disk Utility.
>
> Thereafter, I've had problems with doing a normal Restart. That now
> seems OK after a Force Restart and a couple of tries.
>
> But what is still a problem is Safari and iChat won't launch either from
> the dock or from their location. They either show the arrow below their
> icon in the dock or they do the bouncing thing but they don't launch.
>
> Any advice as how to repair. I've run DU and Disk Warrior but all was OK
> and still doing it.
>
> Thanks for any advice.
>
> PS Safari just launched after bouncing for about 5 minutes, iChat still
> with an arrow below it and not launching. And when I tried to quit and
> launch Safari, it again wouldn't launch.

Solved. But how/why???

OP Responding to my own post.

I set up a second User account. Logged In and tried to start Safari.
Same problem. I logged out. I logged back in to this second account and
tried again and Safari started right up as did iChat.

Went back to my account, they both worked.

Now I'm curious. Any ideas as to what was wrong and why now fixed by
this method. Hopefully a permanent fix.

Thank you.

--
Please send email to: nwhiii at yahoo dot com