Fix: All modal windows open automatically when switching to teaBASE preference pane

[stevenlei]

Issue Description

When switching to the teaBASE preference pane after having another custom preference pane open, all modal windows (SSH passphrase, GPG passphrase, Homebrew install, etc.) open automatically at once, instead of opening on-demand when their respective features are accessed.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Open System Settings
2. Open any other custom preference pane first
3. Switch to teaBASE preference pane
4. All modal windows open automatically

Expected Behavior

Modal windows should only open when their respective features are accessed by the user (on-demand), not automatically when switching to the preference pane.

Root Cause

The preference pane's window management is not properly handling the window state when switching between panes.

Proposed Solution

Add proper window management to close all modal windows when switching between panes and ensure they only open on user interaction.

[stevenlei]

Actually it looks like a macOS bug, I tried to close all other windows in willSelect, it does close the windows when I open teaBASE as the second custom prefpane in the System Preferences app.

However, these modals do not react to cursor events after that, while we can still interact with the keyboard.

I am still trying different approaches to solve this strange behaviour.

[mxcl]

Cannot reproduce with “SwiftDefaultApps” prefpane that I have to hand. Let’s drill down. What macOS version you have?

[stevenlei]

I am using 14.7.1 (23H222), Apple M2

I tried to create a brand new Prefpane from the Xcode template, and add one more window to the default XIB, go through the same steps and it does show up the additional window (Problematic again).

After that, I try to separate the second window from the main XIB, and wire it up with a WindowController, the problem gone.

[mxcl]

k cool, let me test in a macOS 14 https://tart.run container.

And yeah, we should be using separate xibs anyway.

[mxcl]

I think this is because “visible at launch” is checked. Next version will uncheck these and we'll see if it fixes it.

[stevenlei]

I think this is because “visible at launch” is checked. Next version will uncheck these and we'll see if it fixes it.

I have tried that but it doesn't work, maybe moving the sub windows to another XIB would help, but that is not a small change, so may wait for the next stable build before implementing it as the dev_tools branch has a lot of changes recently