Changed permissions for "Everyone" to "No Access" and can no longer log in

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Cantabiles

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hi.. I'm starting a new thread because I need specific instruction for my problem I'm really very worried that one wrong move could jeopardize the data in my HD..

yesterday I tried to adjust permissions in my system. I'm using a MacBook running leopard.. I changed permissions for the entire "macintosh HD" for "everyone" to no access. then I tried to log out of the admin account and then the problem started..

the screen stays at the blue screen where the gear spins in the foreground. after a few seconds the screen refreshes but the same thing repeats itself forever. I believe the problem is with the permissions issue. I'm typing on my iPhone now..

I have tried booting from my mac os x installation disk and ran "disk utilities" from "utilities". but both "verify permissions" and "repair permissions" gave the same error that is, it reported failure on exit. so the first aid operation failed. what can I do from here? should I try using terminal? but I have no idea of the commands. scary too.. I ran "verify disk" and it reported the disk appears to be OK.

any help is greatly appreciated.. I'm desperate.. thanks!!
 
a re-installation will be my very very last resort because i left out 2 folders of my video editing files in my time machine backups..

but i still have a hunch that this problem could be solved without a re-installion because verifying my disk shows my macintosh HD is OK and the S.M.A.R.T is verified. the drive and its contents are perfectly intact. just the permissions. when i click "verify permissions" or "repair permissions", an error shows up which is "The underlying task reported failure on exit".

Anyone knows how to go around this error? how about using terminal? i merely changed permissions for everyone to no access but i kept read/write for admin and system...
 
Hmmn, there might be a solution via logging in in single user mode, but I am not enough of a terminal guru to tell you how.

You could do an archive & install - this reinstalls the OS but leaves all your files untouched. Might work to giive you a fresh install with correct permissions. To do that go through the installation process but look out for a button marked 'options' that allows you to choose Archive & Install - it comes up after you select the volume to install on. The only difficulty is you need to have left enough free space to install the system again.

To make sure your files are backed up, if you have another mac you might be able to start your machine in firewire target mode (assuming your macbook isn't one of the new firewireless ones). Info is here.

Id wait to see if someone else knows a terminal fix, else the target mode to backup those folders then an archive and install is probably worth a go.
 
thank u very much ora! archive and install sounds viable but I'm worried that after archiving, the new install wouldn't have permissions to access the archived data.. what do u think?

meanwhile I will still wait for a terminal fix from a pro haha..

thanks anyways.. =)
 
How does one get into single-user mode? My laptop hangs on start-up, and I get the message "The underlying task reported failure on exit" (I did the same as Cantabiles) when I run the Disk Utiliyu from the OSX start-up disk

Thanks
 
Sorry - should have looked up single user mode for myself. Haver now done so, implemented your suggestion (although I needed to modify line 1 to "/sibn/mount -uw /" as described by the terminal display). All is now well - many thanks for your sapient advice.
 
thanks g/re/p! your solution worked like a breeze without needing any modification at all!
thank u so much i don't know what i could do for u.. but really thanks thanks thanks!

just a little more.. may i know what the first 2 commands actually did..?

thanks thanks thanks...!!!!

thanks for all who helped in any way.

i'm a happy man. =)
 
mount -uw / mounts the disk in read/write mode, so that you can use chmod 775 /Volumes/'Macintosh HD' to change the permissions back to default: rwx-r-xr-x
 
g/re/p said:
mount -uw / mounts the disk in read/write mode, so that you can use chmod 775 /Volumes/'Macintosh HD' to change the permissions back to default: rwx-r-xr-x
Click to expand...

permission denied when I wrote in the first line in terminal (cant get into the single user mode anyhow)
help pleazzzzzzzzzz!!
 
g/re/p said:
mount -uw / mounts the disk in read/write mode, so that you can use chmod 775 /Volumes/'Macintosh HD' to change the permissions back to default: rwx-r-xr-x
Click to expand...

Hi, i am having the same issue but for whatever reason I still can not solve the problem. I have tried typing the commands in a number of different ways, word for word as you have them with spaces and upper and lower case, then variations without spaces etc. Nothing.

1/ mount -uw / appears to do nothing, it just says root.

If I type mount -uw instead it says /dev/disk0s2 on....... and two more lines. Is this correct?

2/ chmod 775 /Volumes/'Macintosh HD' word for word (spaces and caps) tells me no such file or directory exists.

What should happen when I type these commands? I don't know what I am missing but I must be doing something wrong if it has helped 18 others.

Please help, I can't use my machine at the moment
Thanks
 
phew... had this issue last night - panic!! the fix worked perfectly - save that I also had to modify the code "/sibn/mount -uw /" as per what the terminal suggested. THANK YOU!
 
Stephania had this problem when I came home from work. She too said she had changed permission on her system disk. She got it into single user mode and was "fsuck-fly"-ing it. What, you ask? Yes, following the instructions at http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1417...

fsck -fy

Oh I get it. I'm an oldskool unix guy, so for me this is pronounced "fisk" but got a chuckle anyway.

We're on OSX 9.8.0 - Leopard on PPC. We saw a few variations but got it to work.

First, you guys who are getting permission denied need to mount your disk read-write (single-user mode starts it in read-only to prevent you from f-sucking a writable partition, a good precaution). The apple instructions for our version were incorrect:

'df -hl'
showed us "root_partition" or something instead of /dev/disk0s3 -- on boot to single user mode we have a message that says something like "if you want to make changes to your filesystem run:
fsck ....
mount /dev/disk0s3 -uw"

so we did just that. we ran f-suck then

mount -uw /dev/disk0s3

Next, her system disk was renamed to EMPTYNESS so our volume was listed in /Volumes/EMPTYNESS. The permissions there were drwxr-xr-x which was pretty much OK BUT:
ls -al /Volumes/EMPTYNESS revealed it was just a symlink to /

'ls -al /' showed that . had drwx------ YAY this has got to be the problem.

the final solution was to run:

chmod 755 /
 
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