Are there cautions about new Sequoia 15.4.1 update?

eercolani wrote:

I have a new MacBook Pro with Sequoia 15.3.2. Concerned about doing updates on my new laptop, especially the updates for system and Pages, Keynote, Numbers, GarageBand. Please advise I don't want to lose my documents.

15.4.1 is mandatory now for all ~ 3000 employees with Macs where I work. No one has lost any documents. I did the update on the Mac I use and it executed in about 15 minutes with no issues. The Mac now stores its operating system in a separate sealed read-only volume Sealed Key Protection (SKP) - Apple Support (CA), so doing a MacOS update does not touch your documents, which are on a different volume. As others indicated, you are always protected if you make a backup before proceeding. I suggest two backups, and verify that they work by restoring a few selected files or folders. Apple's Time Machine comes built in to every Mac and works well for this.

As these forums are for users who have issues you are likely to see posts saying 15.4.1 is bad. Don’t believe that. Sequoia 15.4.1 is well into its current cycle and the vast majority of major bugs have been eliminated. What’s left are annoying glitches for SOME users, not all users.

Sequoia 15.4 patched some 50 security issues to protect users. You should update to 15.4.1 without equivocation.

Before updating it is always recommended by experienced users to BACKUP the files and documents you are concerned about. Better safe than sorry.

I updated several Mac's without any issues.

Update macOS on Mac - Apple Support

macOS updates improve stability, performance and compatibility.

What's new in the updates for macOS Sequoia - Apple Support

Regardless you should always have a good backup strategy.

Back up your Mac with Time Machine - Apple Support

I also do backups using CCC https://bombich.com/

eercolani wrote:

I have a new MacBook Pro with Sequoia 15.3.2. Concerned about doing updates on my new laptop, especially the updates for system and Pages, Keynote, Numbers, GarageBand. Please advise I don't want to lose my documents.

I would not expect to lose documents(?) Never had that as an experience, but I have only been using Mac's OS X since at least 2003. Of course your experience may have been different.

The current stable release of Sequoia including bug fixes, security updates is macOS 15.4.1

Keep your Mac up to date - Apple Support

Keep your Mac up to date - Apple Support

ref: Update macOS on Mac - Apple Support

If you are waiting for someone to tell you it’s okay to update you’ll never do it. Ten people may tell you it’s okay but if even one says they have issues you will hesitate. That thinking is your problem to deal with.

Remember, these forums are like a hospital. Only the sick come here while the rest of us are happily healthy using our Macs running Sequoia 15.4.1. If you went into a town’s hospital and saw only sick people would you conclude the entire town is unhealthy and choose not the live there? Think about that.

Finally, macOS Sequoia is nearing the end of its life cycle at 15.4.1 and the next version of macOS will likely be announced at WWDC this June. All major, show stopping issues have long been dealt with and future updates will likely concentrate on security flaws and newly discovered exploits. For this reason alone you should definitely update. Sequoia 15.4.1 fixed two security flaws that Apple thinks were being exploited in the real world. Sequoia 15.4 fixed over fifty.

And by the way, your profile says you are running 15.3. Are you satisfied? Is it performing well for you? Well, the version you are using was declared to be the worst ever update Apple has ever released by some users here. Every release of an update by Apple is declared to be faulty and show stopping by some. What does that tell you about listening to users here in the hospital?

There is a bug I discovered and I have verified with others that was present from the beginning of Sequoia, which has not been corrected in any update up to 15.4.1, to which I'm about to update. The bug is, if in Finder, you highlight the title of a file by double clicking it, and then click the Edit button in the top menu bar, then choose Copy from the drop-down menu, unless you have just restarted your MacBook, "Copy" will be followed by the name of a file, but it will not be the file you have highlighted and are about to copy, it will be a previous file, either directly previously copied or sometimes several copies before. However, if you do copy that way the file title highlighted will be properly copied. The proper function should be that there is no title following the word "Copy", as when you do a right click and copy something from the drop-down menu, or how it has been from the top menu in all previous OS before Sequoia. Showing the title of file should only occur from the top menu bar if you click on the file once to select it with that highlighting the text, after which you can copy the entire file, not just the text of the title. This persistence of a file title in the Copy button from the Edit function of the top menu bar, in my opinion, can be a security issue if someone is using your computer and they see the name of a previous file copied that may have been private (no one else uses my computer so that particular issue is not concerned for me, but it's the principle). I have had titles persist in that copy button even after I deleted the original file it came from. I pointed this out to Apple several times even filing a bug report but they told me they didn't consider it a security issue. Nonetheless, it is a bug that has not been fixed. I hope it will be fixed in the next OS.

I'm using a MacBook M3 Pro Max, which came installed with Sequoia. If I recall everyone with Sequoia found the bug, I think even on older machines but I'm not sure. It doesn't happen if you copy from a right click drop-down menu. And maybe if you had just restarted your MacBook you wouldn't see it, because the first time or two of using it after restarting MacBook it shows just "Copy" as it should, but after repeating the action of copy the text of a file title once or maybe a few times it reverts back to retaining the previous title that you copied and showing that as the file name text you're about to copy. Also I just confirmed, if you just select a file without highlighting it, the copy button from the top bar edit button will correctly show that file you selected, but if you double click the file to highlight the text of the file name it will show a previous file name, not that one. It's a real bug I don't know why they haven't fixed it

Apple update Sequoia 15.4.1 has messed up my iMac.  For example,  Apple Mail has added back 5,000+ deleted emails into one account, deleted another email account, and restored a mail account that I haven’t used for ten years.  And shows as recent in Excel spreadsheets from 2013!!!

Red and Blue wrote:

There is a bug I discovered and I have verified with others that was present from the beginning of Sequoia, which has not been corrected in any update up to 15.4.1, to which I'm about to update. The bug is, if in Finder, you highlight the title of a file by double clicking it, and then click the Edit button in the top menu bar, then choose Copy from the drop-down menu, unless you have just restarted your MacBook, "Copy" will be followed by the name of a file, but it will not be the file you have highlighted and are about to copy, it will be a previous file, either directly previously copied or sometimes several copies before. However, if you do copy that way the file title highlighted will be properly copied. The proper function should be that there is no title following the word "Copy", as when you do a right click and copy something from the drop-down menu, or how it has been from the top menu in all previous OS before Sequoia. Showing the title of file should only occur from the top menu bar if you click on the file once to select it with that highlighting the text, after which you can copy the entire file, not just the text of the title. This persistence of a file title in the Copy button from the Edit function of the top menu bar, in my opinion, can be a security issue if someone is using your computer and they see the name of a previous file copied that may have been private (no one else uses my computer so that particular issue is not concerned for me, but it's the principle). I have had titles persist in that copy button even after I deleted the original file it came from. I pointed this out to Apple several times even filing a bug report but they told me they didn't consider it a security issue. Nonetheless, it is a bug that has not been fixed. I hope it will be fixed in the next OS.

That's interesting but I can't get Mac to exhibit this "bug." I am using a 2019 MacBook Pro (Intel). Is yours an Intel or a Silicon Mac? I will also try this on my M3 MacBook Pro when I get to it later today.

Red and Blue wrote:

I'm using a MacBook M3 Pro Max, which came installed with Sequoia. If I recall everyone with Sequoia found the bug, I think even on older machines but I'm not sure.

Why do you think it's a bug and not intentional? It certainly makes sense that, if I highlighted something and then went to "Copy," I'd want to copy what was highlighted.

If you let someone use your computer while logged into your account, the title of a file being shown is the least of your worries. If you're concerned about security when someone else is using your computer, use the Guest Account. That way, they see none of your information and everything they do gets removed when they log out.

I back up my documents daily (ok, hourly) to iCloud and weekly via Time Machine. I am preparing to update to 15.4.1, but have an M1 MBP. Does anyone know if there are any issues with M1s making this update, or as previously mentioned, have all the bugs been worked out? I use daily for school as well as for work, and despite backing up regularly, I just don't have the time for any BS. Any input would be appreciated.

Red and Blue wrote:

I'm using a MacBook M3 Pro Max, which came installed with Sequoia. If I recall everyone with Sequoia found the bug, I think even on older machines but I'm not sure. It doesn't happen if you copy from a right click drop-down menu. And maybe if you had just restarted your MacBook you wouldn't see it, because the first time or two of using it after restarting MacBook it shows just "Copy" as it should, but after repeating the action of copy the text of a file title once or maybe a few times it reverts back to retaining the previous title that you copied and showing that as the file name text you're about to copy. Also I just confirmed, if you just select a file without highlighting it, the copy button from the top bar edit button will correctly show that file you selected, but if you double click the file to highlight the text of the file name it will show a previous file name, not that one. It's a real bug I don't know why they haven't fixed it

So I just tried this on a MacBook Pro M3 Max on 15.4.1 and I can't get it to reproduce what you describe.

I don't know what you have installed that somehow leads to what you see but I suspect there are more important things to worry about. In any case, I can't reproduce this on Silicon nor Intel MacBook Pros on 15.4.1.

You're right about the relative importance of that issue as far as security if someone else is using your account, but it is still a bug, and it annoys me because it distracts me when I go to copy that way. I've learned to more often and more easily, unless I'm already up near the top bar, coping with Command C now. But it is not intentional--it never worked that way before. You misunderstand the problem, going by your statement. If something is highlighted and you go to copy, does not show the name of the file you're about to copy that's the bug--it shows the previous copied file. However if you proceed with clicking copy it will still copy the correct file that has been highlighted, it's just distracting. If you restart your computer and start fresh it will not show that behavior sometimes it takes a few copying events before it starts with the persistence of a previously copied file. And if you just click on a file without highlighting it it will show the correct title of the file, but then if you highlight that text by double clicking the copy function will show the title of the previously copied file title text. The correct function is if you highlight the text of a file and go to copy it should just say copy it should not have any title in there, especially not a previous title.

I just updated to Sequoia 15.4.1, and it's still doing that behavior. The first time I tried it after the MacBook has been updated or restarted, if I highlight a file title text first and click the top edit button, it just says Copy. But as soon as I select a file without highlighting it and click the Edit button it will properly show the full title of the file after Copy. However after that if I double click and highlight another file, I don't even have to have copied the text of a previous file, just the fact that I opened the Edit function on the top bar while a file was selected will cause it to retain that title when I go to copy a double clicked text file of another file. I suggest you try it again--I'm pretty sure it's a universal bug, as several other people could reproduce it last year, including someone in AppleCare customer support I believe, when they correctly followed procedure.