The first is to click on the Apple menu in the corner of your screen and select Force Quit. If that doesn’t work, then you can use the Force Quit feature. However, since it’s outside the program, it sometimes works if the program has become unresponsive. This is really the same as selecting quit inside the program. The first way, which is the easiest, is to simply right click (two fingers on the track pad) the program in the Dock and select quit. If the whole computer will not respond, your only alternative is a complete shutdown. This assumes that only the program is unresponsive and not the whole computer. If a program become unresponsive or locks up, there are basically two ways to force it to close without shutting down the computer. Always try to shut your computer down by clicking on the Apple menu and then on Shut Down. When not allowed to shut down in an orderly fashion, they can become corrupted and eventually not run at all. Normally when a program is shut down, all files are closed and updated in an orderly manner.

This can cause files on your computer to become stuck in an open state. The computer should never be shut down with the power button when programs are still open.

Restarting your computer by simply powering it off during normal operation is NOT recommended. I’ve lost count of the number of time I’ve been told by a client that they just hit the power button when a program stopped working. What does not seem to be common knowledge among Windows or MAC users however, is that the computer does not necessarily have to be restarted if a program becomes unresponsive.

And while it takes much more to do it to a MAC than a Windows computer, a MAC will occasionally lock up and have to be restarted too. While this is usually more of a problem with Windows based computers, MAC programs do occasionally become unresponsive. In the more serious cases, the entire computer locks up and must be restarted. In more serious cases, the program just stops working and you get a perpetual spinning color wheel. If given enough time, it may become responsive again. In mild cases, a program will just “hang” for a while. No matter how sophisticated our computers get, the problem of programs becoming unresponsive is still with us. (Click here to read the Windows version of this article)

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