I accidentally my mac

S

Stupidnoob

Registered
Hey guys, so, long story short, I'm a stupid retard.
I entered the rm -rf /* command, curious, and was expecting some sort of "Enter password to continue" prompt to appear. It didn't. I was able to stop the process but it deleted most of my applications, including most of my apps.
How can I go about getting back the OS X apps? I.E. iChat, Garage Band, Address book, iCal? Also, please note, my Superdrive is broken and won't read any type of CD/DVD...
I know it must be pretty compelling to abandon such a disgrace to darwin as myself on my own, but please have some compassion.
 
I am... I stopped it so it didn't delete everything, but I don't know how far it went. I'm kinda scared to turn it off.
 
What's the saying - "Curiousity killed the cat!"
So, now you have found out why the root user is dangerous, because it will let you basically ruin your installed system, while you are still using it! - and, without warning you...
If you keep your bootable backup on an external hard drive, then you can easily put everything back from your current backup.
I'm guessing "no backup" - so, this will be a good opportunity to spend some money.
Either replace your internal superdrive - or purchase an external optical drive.
You can also do what you need (which is to reinstall your OS X system and all your apps) by connecting to another Mac via a FireWire cable, and using Firewire Target boot mode to boot your 'broken' Mac to a working one.
 
Ok, the situation doesn't seem to be as bad as I thought it might have been. From the looks of it, the only folder affected was Applications and most applications are safe. With regards to reinstalling OS X, would my documents, preferences and settings remain the same? Would a full reinstall be necessary if my OS is still 'healthy' or could I just selectively reinstall the iLife apps? Thanks for your time
 
Stupidnoob said:
With regards to reinstalling OS X, would my documents, preferences and settings remain the same?
Click to expand...

Should be fine unless some unseen files got deleted. May want to do a backup prior to reinstalling just to be safe.

Why would you play around with that command in the first place?
 
Stupidnoob said:
Ok, the situation doesn't seem to be as bad as I thought it might have been. From the looks of it, the only folder affected was Applications and most applications are safe. With regards to reinstalling OS X, would my documents, preferences and settings remain the same? Would a full reinstall be necessary if my OS is still 'healthy' or could I just selectively reinstall the iLife apps? Thanks for your time
Click to expand...

If the only thing deleted was your iLife apps, then you can easily just reinstall those from the installer disc; whether it came with the Mac OS X install disc or you actually bought the separate iLife disc.

If it did actually delete more than just one application and you would want to reinstall Mac OS X. I would actually do a full reinstall as you don't really know if that is all that got deleted. However, you would of course need to buy a backup drive because a full reinstall will wipe all data off your drive. Having a backup, like stated before will help in situations like this, so it's a win win situation.
 
Guys thank you all for helping, turns out since I was able to stop the process early my mac (with the exception of the Applications folder) was left unharmed. All I did was transfer the apps from a friend's computer via USB and now everything (more/less) is back to normal.
Thanks for the cooperation despite my stupidity. Peace out.
 
Dear noob:

Please setup "TimeMachine" and run backups. and inexpensive external optical drive can be had for 40-50 dollars at plaves like fryes and the like.

As a programmer with 30+ years of experience the numerous ways to loose data/applications is unlimited... Backups will save you WHEN (not IF) things go bad.

Best of Luck.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top