Applications Folder Decides It Doesn't Want to be Edited... Help!

Bluefusion

Bluefusion

Into the Breach
My Applications folder just randomly turned off write access for me, and turned itself into owner:system, group:admin. I can't add or edit things in there. WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED? Nothing I did should have caused this. Literally, in the MIDDLE of a file transfer, it told me that I could not write to the folder "Applications" because I do not have write access. WTF?
 
try this in the terminal:

sudo chmod 700 /applications

then type your password.

BTW, i'm not UNIX genius, so you might want to aska round some more if it doesn't work.
 
Aargh! sudo asks me for a password but won't let me type, and the application didn't work for some reason. It said it restored everything, but it, uh, kind of didn't...
 
sudo will ask for your root password (which by default is set to your own password when you first setup OS X). This is the same password you type into installers.

If you type the password carefully at the password prompt and hit enter it should work. The terminal will not give any feedback that you are typing anything, but it is there.
 
sorry bluefusion! i typed sudo 700 by mistake, i should have said 777. Unfortunately i decided i would test it out on my computer and it has since, locked me out of my applications folder, which includes netinfo and the terminal. I'm on another computer now. Whats the keystroke for single user mode again?

sorry bout that.:(
 
AHHHHHHHH this is a nightmare!
Phil, I did 777 and NO APPS CAN LAUNCH. The Apps folder appears with its icon and will not list its size. I can't open Terminal, etc... am I going to have to reinstall OS X? It's startin' to look like it...

(I'm plugged into the router through my iBook for this message)
 
Nope, no fix there. I can't remove the Logitech driver, I have no clue where it put all of its files...


I'm going to have to reinstall X; but since it's already 12:10 a.m. I'll have to do it tomorrow. :)

Any more suggestions that might fix it, before I get too drastic?
 
I dunno but how about logging in as root and changing the permisions there. It might have been already mentioned but I've just been skimming this post.


Joe
 
I'll try it when I get home, but don't you have to enable root access in NetInfoManager first? If that's the case, I can't since I can't open any apps (the applications folder, as far as my Mac is concerned, doesn't exist...) *sigh* looks like a quick trip into OS 9 and a backup/reinstall is in order.
 
ah, i've been waiting for this for a long time. finally a tip for 'terminal use' that screwed up a user's system.

btw, THAT's why the root account is disabled on Mac OS X by default.

777, btw, also lets GUESTS read, write and execute. this should NEVER be used on a system that is on the net, unless it only involves really unimportant files/directories.
 
Originally posted by fryke
ah, i've been waiting for this for a long time. finally a tip for 'terminal use' that screwed up a user's system.

btw, THAT's why the root account is disabled on Mac OS X by default.

777, btw, also lets GUESTS read, write and execute. this should NEVER be used on a system that is on the net, unless it only involves really unimportant files/directories.
Click to expand...
Want another terminal command that will mess up your system? sudo rm -rf /* should mess up quite a bit before it fails. Or how about sudo chmod 000 /usr/bin/*?

There are many many many more ways to mess up your system. Some of them obvious like these commands, some not so obvious. I'm not sure why you sound surprised that there are commands out there that will mess things up...
 
Originally posted by Bluefusion
I'll try it when I get home, but don't you have to enable root access in NetInfoManager first? If that's the case, I can't since I can't open any apps (the applications folder, as far as my Mac is concerned, doesn't exist...) *sigh* looks like a quick trip into OS 9 and a backup/reinstall is in order.
Click to expand...
There's a thread on this -- you don't need NetInfo to enable root access... in the Howto on the second page -- http://www.macosx.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10965

Did booting up in single-user mode not work? You basically have root powers in single-user mode, so you should be able to do anything you need to.

Edit:
Forgot to mention that even if you can't get Terminal running, you could boot into single-user, fsck, then mount the root partition and perform any terminal commands there...
 
Sorry bluefusion on that bad advice. Finally just got my comp fixed after two days of permissions battles. If your comp is working like me did, it wouldn'treally listen to many of the commands you issue to it in single user mode. So, as a solution I moved the terminal.app outside of the applications folder and then rebooted and accessed the terminal there.

Sorry bout that. Has helped me sharpen my unix though....;)
 
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