# Even root can't delete this file...



## michaelsanford (Nov 30, 2002)

I was doing a ditto to copy my ~/ to an external volume as a backup, and it got to the following file and stopped, and only ended up copying about half of my user folder, and none of my ~/Movies ~/Music (which are my two most iportant!)

So I decided to clean up the backup folder to start afresh, and got this (after trying sudo):

```
[localhost:hermes/_gwailo/documents] root# rm *
override rw-r--r--  gwailo/staff for Grocery List? yes
rm: Grocery List: Operation not permitted
```

I originally issued "rm -r _gwailo" which worked for every file except this one, which gave me the same override prompt.

Extra: hermes is a symbolic link to /Volumes/Hermes which is why it looks like a relative path from ~/.

Hello what's this then: it doesn't preface my folder name with an underscore in the override prompt (which it should). Is that the problem? I don't see why it would be sice I am IN that folder, and not referencing it from above...?

WTH?!


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## UtaTr3y (Nov 30, 2002)

You need to change the permissions of the file... root only means that you can delete/edit unprotected files... The current file is read only for root and user... only the files within are read/write... These are probably folders that Mac OS X needs to be in one place...

Try man rm, there is a command to overide permissions, just make sure you understand what it will be doing as you can delete EVERYTHING on the computer using that command and a simple variable...


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## cbaron (Nov 30, 2002)

You may be a victim of the privilege issue that appeared with 10.1.5 update.

This problem is well known on Apple's knowledge base, article 106726.

Try to use the "Repair Privileges" utility provided from this page, then remove your file again, I can't help you more.


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## anarchie (Nov 30, 2002)

Or you could use filesystem software that couldn't care less about owners/perms, like OS 9's.  Of course, restarting is someting I only do in the most dire circumstances.


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## michaelsanford (Nov 30, 2002)

cbaron: I don't understand what printer privileges have to do with this problem  but thanks anyway...

UtaTr3y: nice try, but no; root has access to everything, hence the monacre "super-user". How do you see that it's read-only for root and user from the privs line anyway, which says it's 'rw' for the user (owner)?

I think the rm flag you're thinking of is "-f", but all that does it prevent the override prompt from appearing (i.e., defauly to y), so it fails anyway 

*-rw-r--r--  1 gwailo  staff    25939 Nov 23 18:13 Grocery List*

It can't be a regular privileges issue because as I mentioned, I tried deleting the file with rm from my user account, who OWNS the file, and it didn't work.

Thanks anyways guys!!


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## michaelsanford (Nov 30, 2002)

AHA! I got it....

It was an Apple HFS+ filesystem flag error, which corrupted the files permissions (I'm not talking about the linux permission here).

Fixed it with *sudo chflags -R nouchg **

I asked a friend about it, who deftly coded the solution; thanks!


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## UtaTr3y (Dec 2, 2002)

> UtaTr3y: nice try, but no; root has access to everything, hence the monacre "super-user". How do you see that it's read-only for root and user from the privs line anyway, which says it's 'rw' for the user (owner)?



Try reading through some of your man pages, it states what they all mean...

The middle 3 values (r--, or rw-) define roots permissions... the end 3 define current users permissions. The first 3 digits define OS permissions. If the first 3 are set to r-- then chances are its a BIOS file...

Like I said though, check your man pages to make sure, I could be wrong, but am 90% sure - as a Linux user - that I am correct...


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## anarchie (Dec 2, 2002)

> _Originally posted by UtaTr3y _
> *
> The middle 3 values (r--, or rw-) define roots permissions... the end 3 define current users permissions. The first 3 digits define OS permissions. If the first 3 are set to r-- then chances are its a BIOS file...
> 
> Like I said though, check your man pages to make sure, I could be wrong, but am 90% sure - as a Linux user - that I am correct... *



You, sir, are quite wrong.  I beg of you, please take your own advice and check your man pages and verify your own information before asking others to do so for you.

The first three permission characters describe the file's owner's permissions.  The second three describe the permissions for any user in the file's owning group.  The last three describe the permissions for any user not fitting the above.

Michael:  Please, they are unix permissions.  Both Mac OS X and Linux are derived from Unix, but OS X is not Linux.


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## cbaron (Dec 2, 2002)

> _Originally posted by michaelsanford _
> *cbaron: I don't understand what printer privileges have to do with this problem  but thanks anyway...*



This issue does not affect only printers, the printer stuff is only one out of a few symptoms of this problem. Another one is :

*Unable to add/delete files from the Applications folder*.

you may check those symptoms, and use the utility provided.


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## michaelsanford (Dec 2, 2002)

cbaron, thanks, I'm not sure but I think it may have been a similar problem (see solution).

anarchie: hehe I've been banged for calling it FreeBSD, linux, unix, etc. so I don't know what to call it (subsystem) anymore... I guess Darwin will do?


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## anarchie (Dec 2, 2002)

Darwin, FreeBSD, Unix....OS X contains parts of all of them.  It definitely does not contain any Linux, though.


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## cabbage (Dec 2, 2002)

-rwxrwxrwx
0123456789

123 is the owner
456 is the group
789 is everyone else
0 is if it's a directory or folder


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