I really hate the “Reopen Windows when Logging back”” feautre in MacOS Lion and above. That feature exists because Apple wanted to integrate iOS into MacOS. However, my Macbook uses a HDD, not an SSD, so everytime I log into my computer, it automatically opens all those applications, which takes time and can make my computer run very slowly. Even though I have unchecked the “Reopen windows when logging back in” option in the Shutdown/Restart dialog, my Mac often reopen all my last running applications. I have to wait for all of those stuffs to completed open and then I can use my computer normally.

I was very upset and decided to find a solution to completely disable that feature. And here is the solution.

Use any text editor that you want and create a file named fixlogin.sh in your home directory. Paste this piece of code into the content of the file

#!/bin/bash
echo "#!/bin/bash" > /tmp/loginfix.sh
echo "rm /Users/*/Library/Preferences/ByHost/com.apple.loginwindow.*" >> /tmp/loginfix.sh
mv /tmp/loginfix.sh /usr/bin/loginfix.sh
chmod +x /usr/bin/loginfix.sh
defaults write com.apple.loginwindow LoginHook /usr/bin/loginfix.sh

Open up terminal, chmod that file to executable and then execute it.

$ cd
$ chmod +x fixlogin.sh
$ sudo ./fixlogin.sh

Ok, you are done! The checkbox “Reopen windows when logging back in” will still appear in the shutdown/restart dialog but it has no effect.

Later, when you want to revert back to the behavious of MacOS Lion, issue this command

$ sudo defaults delete com.apple.loginwindow LoginHook

Idea from this post: http://osxdaily.com/2011/08/25/disable-reopen-windows-when-logging-back-in-in-mac-os-x-lion-completely/