extra administrator

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mspain77

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i was installing flip4mac after a few beers, and for some reason i followed the directions to log in as the root administrator to add the support files, though i already was.
now when i boot up i am given the option to log in as either user (both have admin rights), i can't see the other user from system preferences to delete it.
maybe i'm overlooking something fairly obvious, but could someone steer me in the right direction? thanks.
 
"root administrator"? No such thing... it's either root, or it's an administrator, but not both. Are you saying that you enabled the root user, then logged in as root?

You can enable and disable the root user account with NetInfo Manager under the "Security" menu.
 
yeah, that must've been what i did. i guess i always thought that 'root' and admin' were different words for the same thing. thanks God for this site. i'll try that fix after work. thanks diablo.
before i do that, is there any other common reason why i would ever find it beneficial to have that root user available? i figure if people know how to handle this, then they must have done the root user thing a time or two before also.
 
mspain77 said:
before i do that, is there any other common reason why i would ever find it beneficial to have that root user available? i figure if people know how to handle this, then they must have done the root user thing a time or two before also.
Click to expand...
I'd say you should not enable root logins.

You should be able to do everything you need as an administrator and, should you ever need root privileges, it is possible to obtain them using the command "sudo" within the Terminal. Simply type "sudo" followed by a space and the command you want (eg. "sudo ls -al") and you perform the command as root, after having typed in the administrator password. Using "sudo -S" should lets you keep using root privileges, rather than only using them for one command.

So, there should be no need to enable root logins and, in fact, doing so would only really add a potential security risk (for instance if remote access is allowed, and someone tries a brute force approach to getting the root password).
 
Yes. As I said somewhere else recently: If you don't know your way around changing things as root in Terminal using sudo, you should _definitely_ not enable the root account. There's nothing* requiring it, anyway.

*I know there are some exceptions, but those who really _need_ root-logins usually know of those exceptions already - and we're talking about "normal" and "intended" uses of Mac OS X as a consumer operating system here.
 
El Diablo-
I followed your advice of deleting through NetInfo, but now after I restarted my maching is stuck in the startup screen with the blue background. You can see the data loading, but when it gets to the end it just won't start up. I'm locked out of my machine now. What can i do?
 
I didn't recommend deleting the root user -- I recommended disabling the root user:

You can enable and disable the root user account with NetInfo Manager under the "Security" menu.
Click to expand...

Did you delete or disable the root user?
 
Ouch. I don't know an easy way out of that one. As far as I know, the root user is pretty integral to the operation of Mac OS X... I'll poke around and see what I can find, but if I were in that situation, a good ol' reformat and reinstall would be my next logical step.

Perhaps someone else has some knowledge on how to re-create the root user account, if it's possible.
 
I'd say root is root is root and if it's gone, there's no option to bring it back (with what _rights_ would you bring back God after you deleted her...?). I'd say you went as far as it gets to hosing your system and need to reinstall.
 
thanks diablo and fryke for the input. i;m thinking i do need to do a reinstall, but with so much stuff it's going to take forever. if anyone else happens to think there's another way out, please speak up. otherwise i've got my work cut out for me this weekend.
 
hm. i think i've never needed more than half a day for a complete re-install and reconfiguration of one of my Macs... Yeah, it's a drag. But it's always also a good time for cleaning up a bit and only bring back what's really needed. A healthy experience, I think. Just so you also see the positive points about this ugly situation. :)
 
Instead of doing a complete re-install, try an Archive and Install first.
If it works, you won't lose all of your data.
 
I already tried the archive and install, but since the root folder is located in the user folder and archive and install preserves that folder, it did not fill in the blank so to speak and recreate the root folder for me.
 
Hmmm......not sure what you mean here - There is no "Root folder" in the Users folder.

The Users directory is a sub "folder" of the Root directory.

The link that bbloke provided explains how to recover from a deleted root account by using the archive and install method.

mspain77 said:
I already tried the archive and install, but since the root folder is located in the user folder and archive and install preserves that folder, it did not fill in the blank so to speak and recreate the root folder for me.
Click to expand...
 
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