I’m utilizing a Mac Studio (32GB RAM) working macOS Sequoia, and I’ve run right into a Highlight problem that I can’t resolve.
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🧩 How the issue began:
I observed that mds (Highlight indexing course of) was consuming plenty of reminiscence, so I requested ChatGPT the right way to briefly disable Highlight. It urged I run some Terminal instructions and delete a Highlight-related file (sadly I don’t keep in mind the precise file — presumably .Highlight-V100).
Now, Highlight is totally disabled, and I can’t flip it again on, it doesn’t matter what I attempt.
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🧪 What I’ve tried to date:
🔓 Pre-steps:
- Disabled System Integrity Safety (SIP) through csrutil disable
- Disabled authenticated-root through csrutil authenticated-root disable
- Granted Full Disk Entry to Terminal
⚙️ Instructions tried:
sudo mdutil -i on / Indexing and looking disabled.
sudo mdutil -i on /System/Volumes/Information Indexing and looking disabled.
sudo mdutil -E / Indexing and looking disabled.
mdutil -a -s /: Indexing and looking disabled. /System/Volumes/Information: Indexing and looking disabled. /System/Volumes/Preboot: Indexing enabled.
sudo mdutil -i on ~ Error: invalid operation. Error: unknown indexing state.
mdutil -s ~ Error: unknown indexing state.
sudo rm -rf /.Highlight-V100 sudo rm -rf /System/Volumes/Information/.Highlight-V100
Second one fails: “Operation not permitted”
Restarting the metadata server:
sudo launchctl unload -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist Error: Enter/output error
sudo launchctl bootstrap system /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.metadata.mds.plist Bootstrap failed: 5: Enter/output error
❗️ Present state:
- Highlight nonetheless doesn’t work.
- Terminal at all times says “Indexing and looking disabled”.
- mds doesn’t seem in Exercise Monitor anymore.
- The system behaves usually in any other case, however I can not seek for apps, recordsdata, or something through Highlight.
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❓ What I need assistance with:
- How can I absolutely restore Highlight performance?
- Is there a method to recreate the deleted metadata/index recordsdata?
- Would reinstalling macOS over the present system (with out wiping information) repair this?
- Every other repair or workaround could be appreciated.