Common Desktop Errors

Troubleshooting commonly encountered errors on Window and macOS

Georges-Antoine Assi avatar
Written by Georges-Antoine Assi
Updated over a week ago

Resetting the app

If fellow won’t load, or behaves in an unexpected way resetting the app could help. You can do this by accessing the help menu > reset app as pictured below on both Windows and MacOS devices.

On MacOS:

On Windows:

A Javascript error occurred in the main process

This is a general error that indicates a background process has failed. If the specific error message does not appear below, please contact support.

[Windows] "Error: Can not find Squirrel"

This error occurs when the app tried to auto-update, but has not been installed to the system. Fellow should not be run directly from the executable; verify that the app has been correctly installed.

Windows

Microsoft SmartScreen prevented an unrecognized app from running. Running this app might put your PC at risk.

This may happen for one of two reasons:

A. You're attempting to install Fellow on a company computer, and a policy was set by your company's sysadmin/IT to prevent non-whitelisted apps from running. You should contact your sysadmin/IT and ask them to whitelist Fellow.


B. As the desktop app is fairly new, Fellow needs some time to build trust with Microsoft SmartScreen. In this case, you can try the following steps:

  1. Right click on installer (.exe)

  2. Select Properties option.

  3. Click on checkbox to check Unblock at the bottom of Properties.

windows smart screen error message

When I click the X in the top-right corner to close the app, it keeps running the background

Hitting the X in the top-right minimizes the app the to system tray. As long as the Fellow icon is visible in the system tray, the app will continue to run. You can close the app by right-clicking the icon and selecting "Exit".

system tray with fellow icon

The Task Manager shows multiple instances of Fellow/tasks running Fellow

In the task manager, you may see what look like multiple instances of Fellow running. These are in fact multiple threads processing data, and is perfectly normal for a Windows app.

task manager
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