Privleges

bobw

bobw

The Late: SuperMacMod
OS X 10.04 All of a sudden I can't drag anything into the Applications folder, no privileges.

I'm running 10.1.4. I've upgraded each time a new one was released. I don't use OS X, just play with it when I have time. I still use 9.2.1.
I had been able to drag things into the main application folder, now I can't. I get a message that the Applications cannot be modified.
I can drag anything into the user applications folder, just not the main application folder.
In the Show Info for this application folder, the Privileges are greyed out. I can't change anyhting. (owner - system)

Any help appreciated.
 
try this...in the terminal app type
cd /
then type
sudo chmod 775 Applications
enter your password
this should work
 
Unless the owner of the folder is messed up. ls -l will show you the current owner. man chown will tell you how to reset it if it's messed up.

I don't remember the default owner, and I'm on an NT box right now so can't check...
 
Ok, I've tried these. I just get the user (bob), not the owner I'm guessing.

The user "bob" has an application folder, but the main application folder on the root of the drive I can't add to.

Show Info on the hard drive has the Privileges greyed out. How can I change this?

Thanks
 
If the privileges are grayed out, it probably means that you're not the owner, or the user 'bob' is not an admin.

To check the admin status of user bob, go into the System Preferences, choose User. Click on 'Bob' and Edit. (I'm working from memory here, so it might not be exactly this) Make sure there is a check in the box "User has admin privileges" or something like that. Hmm. Fuzzy memory...

What do you see when you ls -l from the root? Let me know if I'm not making sense -- I'm assuming that you're relatively comfortable with Terminal, but I can walk you through it if you want.
 
Did the User Preferences. Check is in User has Admin Privilege.

This is from ls -l in terminal;

Welcome to Darwin!
[localhost:~] bob% ls -l
total 8
drwxrwxr-x 12 bob staff 364 May 7 19:19 Applications
drwx------ 9 bob staff 264 May 8 12:11 Desktop
drwx------ 22 bob staff 704 May 7 13:26 Documents
drwxr-xr-x 4 bob staff 264 May 7 14:39 Incomplete
drwx------ 38 bob staff 1248 May 2 12:24 Library
drwx------ 4 bob staff 264 Apr 28 2001 Movies
drwx------ 4 bob staff 264 Apr 28 2001 Music
drwx------ 5 bob staff 264 Jan 13 14:29 Pictures
drwxr-xr-x 3 bob staff 264 Nov 15 2000 Public
drwxr-xr-x 2 bob staff 264 Apr 4 12:50 Shared
drwxr-xr-x 4 bob staff 264 Feb 13 2001 Sites
-rw-r--r-- 1 root staff 13 Oct 19 2001 com.apple.finder.plist.save
[localhost:~] bob%


My computer name is Robert Wood. There is also a user - Bob

I somehow changed the login to Robert Wood instead of Bob, but still can't drag anything in the applications folder, the main one on the drive. Going to users - bob - I can drag into that application folder. Not that I'm not comfortable with Terminal, just don't know it. Willing to try anything once.

I don't remember creating a user when I installed X. I just wanted the one user, the main one. No one else uses this machine, but opening the hard drive, I have a User folder at the bottom of the list (bob).

I only use 9.2.1 for everything. I'm playing with X trying to learn so I can start using it full time.

Thanks for any help.
 
Show Info on the OS X drive says;
Owner - "system"
Group - "admin" if this helps.

Drop downs are greyed out.

Same for the Applications
 
It looks from your output like you're in the Users folder when you did the 'ls'. Try the following two commands:
cd /
ls -l
and tell me what you get.

From the Terminal, you can type whoami to see which account is logged in.

When you set up the computer for OS X, you have to have at least one user defined for the system. This is probably the user bob in your case. For each account, you have a full name (Like Robert Wood) and a short name (bob). They are the same account, have the same password and privilegs, etc.

In the Users preferences panel, if there's only one user listed, you only have one user on the system.

If the listing (the ls -l command output) doesn't make sense, check out the Unix for Newbies thread for an explanation. You might want to look at that thread anyway to see some basic information.
 
Thanks for your help. In Terminal this is what I get with these commands;

Welcome to Darwin!
[localhost:~] bob% whoami
bob
[localhost:~] bob% cd /
[localhost:/] bob% ls -l
total 115225
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 159744 Apr 27 11:28 AppleShare PDS
drwxr-xr-x 102 root admin 3424 May 7 18:50 Applications
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 0 Dec 31 1969 Desktop
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 159744 May 8 13:26 Desktop DB
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 1149554 May 8 12:08 Desktop DF
drwxrwxrwx 6 root staff 264 May 8 15:57 Desktop Folder
drwxrwxr-x 13 root admin 398 Oct 21 2001 Developer
drwxrwxrwx 7 bob admin 264 Feb 28 09:03 Dock Detox 1.0.1
drwxrw-rw- 13 bob admin 398 May 6 14:56 Documents
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 0 Apr 28 2001 Icon?
drwxrwxr-x 34 root admin 1112 Mar 15 2001 Library
drwxr-xr-x 7 root wheel 264 Oct 20 2001 Network
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 100 Jan 16 14:04 Norton FS Index
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 25600 Feb 5 20:31 OS X Memory Script
drwxr-xr-x 3 root wheel 264 Dec 10 17:45 System
drwxr-xr-x 2 bob unknown 264 Apr 25 2001 TheFindByContentFolder
drwxr-xr-x 4 bob unknown 264 Apr 7 16:13 TheVolumeSettingsFolder
drwxr-xr-x 2 bob unknown 264 May 8 13:23 Trash
drwxr-xr-x 4 root wheel 92 Apr 26 2001 Users
drwxrwxrwt 10 root wheel 296 May 8 15:57 Volumes
dr-xr-xr-x 1 root wheel 512 May 8 16:08 automount
drwxr-xr-x 33 root wheel 1078 Dec 23 10:02 bin
lrwxrwxr-t 1 root admin 13 May 8 13:27 cores -> private/cores
dr-xr-xr-x 2 root wheel 512 May 8 13:27 dev
lrwxrwxr-t 1 root admin 11 May 8 13:27 etc -> private/etc
-rw-r--r-- 1 bob staff 549 Apr 20 10:30 idisk- maktek
lrwxrwxr-t 1 root admin 9 May 8 13:27 mach -> /mach.sym
-r--r--r-- 1 root admin 563960 May 8 13:27 mach.sym
-rw-r--r-- 1 root wheel 3160824 Apr 10 12:28 mach_kernel
drwxr-xr-x 7 root wheel 264 May 8 13:27 private
drwxr-xr-x 59 root wheel 1962 Feb 19 21:47 sbin
drwxr-xr-x 18 bob admin 568 May 6 15:00 sit files
lrwxrwxr-t 1 root admin 11 May 8 13:27 tmp -> private/tmp
drwxr-xr-x 12 root wheel 364 Sep 2 2001 usr
lrwxrwxr-t 1 root admin 11 May 8 13:27 var -> private/var
-rwxr-xr-x 1 bob unknown 53709312 Apr 25 18:23 ???T+???OS X
[localhost:/] bob%
 
Aha!

This is your problem (with points so I can dissect it):
Code: 
drwxr-xr-x 102 root admin 3424 May 7 18:50 Applications
^^^^^^^^^^     ^^^^ ^^^^^
permissions    user group

The drwxr... stuff show permissions. I'll break it down:

d = shows that this is a directory

first three positions (rwx in this case): User permissions. So user 'root' (default on any Unix-based system, you didn't need to create it for it to be there) can Read, Write, and eXecute. Executing a directory simply means that you can go into it.

second three positions (r-x) are for group. The dash means disabled. So everyone in the admin group can read and execute the directory, but not write to it. That's a problem, and we'll fix it in a second.

last three positions are for others, but it's set the same as the group so I won't go into that part of it. Others means everyone who is not the owner of the file/folder and not in the group.

To find out your information, type id and it should spew out a whole buncha information about user bob.

Since the owner of the Applications directory is 'root', you'll have to sudo your command. And to change permissions use the chmod command.

What? Isn't that enough info for you? ;)

OK, go back to what gigi said in the first reply to this thread (modified slightly for my explanation):
Go into Terminal, type
cd /
sudo chmod go+w Applications
enter your password, then poof, everything should be fine. And of course come back if it isn't

The go+w part of the chmod command means change Group and Others access to be able to write. gigi used octal, and it's the same thing, but harder to understand. gigi also set the Others access to read and execute, but not write. It's your call. If you are not part of the admin group (I suspect that you are) then you'll need to set this to write-able if you want to be able to write to the Applications folder.

So, I could have probably kept my big ol' mouth shut and you'd probably have gotten the same results... :rolleyes:

But you learned stuff about the Terminal, right? :)
 
Thanks for the replies.

This command in Terminal worked;

% sudo chmod 775 /Applications
 
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