Picto-Selector on Mac OSX High Sierra

When you want to use Picto-Selector on a Mac OSX computer you can run into trouble starting it after upgrading to High Sierra.

If you encounter the situation that Picto-Selector is not running there are a few things you can check:

• Did you download the November 2017 version or newer? There was a change needed in the wrapper to make it work properly.
• Is Picto-Selector permitted to run?  First, double-click the application. Once the prompt appears saying it cannot be opened, cancel it and launch System Preferences. Navigate to the Security & Privacy section, and under the General tab you’ll see your blocked program. Simply click Open Anyway to launch it. As before, you only need to do this once.
• Is verifying the application taking very long? You can disable this by using the terminal and use the command below. This can be useful because it leaves quarantining in general on, as well as Gatekeeper, but means that a specific file will no longer bring up the prompt. From Terminal:
  xattr -d com.apple.quarantine /path-to-quarantined-file
  Replace /path-to-quarantined-file with your file’s location, or simply drag the file onto the Terminal window at that part of the command. It will now slip through Gatekeeper’s net as a “known safe file”.
• When everything else fails, you can disable the checks completely for all files downloaded:
  1. Open Terminal from /Applications/Utilities, or via Spotlight.
  2. At the prompt, enter the following command:
     defaults write com.apple.LaunchServices LSQuarantine -bool false
  3. Hit Enter to issue the command.
  4. To check that the preference has been correctly set, enter this command at the prompt:
     defaults read com.apple.LaunchServices
     If it has been set, the printout should show LSQuarantine = 0.
  5. Reboot your computer to apply the changes.
  6. After the reboot, test it out by trying to open Picto-Selector.

For more information about running applications downloaded from the internet see this blog.