Sidebar favourites in dispute

The two versions of Finder’s sidebar, listing favourites, devices and so on have somehow become different on my Mac running OS X El Capitan 10.11.5. Viewed in Finder, that sidebar looks correct, with a single Desktop item. However, viewed in an app’s Save dialog, the Desktop item is shown twice under Favourites. Why is this, and how can I fix it? [ JANET GOLDNER ]

Ian Sleightholm replies: This shouldn’t be possible. Both are generated by the same code in OS X, and should be identical. Start an app, create a new document and open the Save dialog. Then open a Finder window, and position it so that you can see both sidebars at once. Next, choose ‘Finder > Preferences’ and click the Sidebar tab. Uncheck the Applications item there; that item should immediately disappear from Favorites in Finder and the Save dialog. Sometimes, such preferences get stuck, and trashing the file at ~/Library/ Preferences/com.apple.Finder.plist (the tilde is your home folder; in Finder, hold Option and choose ‘Go > Library’) can allow it to be saved properly. However, the two locations’ behaviour should remain consistent and reliable even if the preferences can’t be saved properly. If the two sidebars don’t behave identically, your Mac most probably still has the remains of an old third-party utility that modifies Save dialogs, such as Default Folder X. Restarting in Safe mode (hold Shift when you hear the startup sound) should disable that to confirm, allowing you to identify and remove those remains.