Benjamin Smith1

Q: Resetting local items keychain

I am the sole administrator on my kid's Macbook Air.

 

Of course, after setting it up I forgot my password and had to reset it

 

Since then, Keychain has been very messed up.

 

When I log in, it asks me for my "Local Items" keychain password which I no longer remember and I have to hit cancel.

 

Then I will periodically get error messages such as

 

A keychain cannot be found to store ....  Registration V1, safari, etc.

I hit reset to defaults but then I get Messages agent wants to use the "Local Items" keychain and I'm back to square one.

 

In Keychain Access, I can't unlock "Local Items," because, again, I don't have the password so I am stuck.  System has been reset to my login password.

 

Any way to delete the local items keychain so I can get on with my life?

 

Thanks


Ben

Posted on Feb 27, 2015 6:22 PM

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Q: Resetting local items keychain

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  • by Kappy,Helpful

    Kappy Kappy Feb 27, 2015 6:26 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1
    Level 10 (270,952 points)
    Desktops
    Feb 27, 2015 6:26 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1

    Tutorial: Resolving Keychain Issues

     

    If you can't access your keychain, or forget your password If you can't get into your keychain file because you've forgotten your password or the keychain file appears to be corrupt, there are a couple of options.

     

    First, if you've forgotten your password, you can use the "Keychain First Aid" utility to make the keychain password the same as the login password. This can be accomplished via the following process:

     

      1. Open Keychain Access (located in Applications/Utilities)

      2. Go to the "Keychain Access" menu and select "Preferences"

      3. Click the "First Aid" tab

      4. Make sure the "Synchronize login keychain password" box is checked

      5. Close the Preferences window

      6. Go to the "Keychain Access" menu and select "Keychain First Aid"

      7. Enter your username and password

      8. Click the "Repair" button

     

    The second option is to completely delete your keychain then recreate it. This routine is useful if your keychain appears to be corrupt or otherwise inaccessible. This can be accomplished as follows:

     

      1. Launch Keychain Access (located in Applications/Utilities)

      2. Click "Show Keychains" in the lower-left corner of the window.

      3. Select the problematic keychain from the left-hand pane.

      4. Navigate to the "File" menu and select "Delete Keychain '(name of keychain)'"

      5. Check all options for deletion and press "OK"

      6. Create a new keychain by going to the "File" menu, then "New" and selecting

          "New Keychain"

      7. You can now make this keychain your default if you desire by selecting it, then

          going to the "File" menu and selecting "Make '(name of keychain)' Default"

     

    Login as root and perform repair In some cases, problems with keychains can only be resolved when logged in as the root user.

     

    First, you want to enable the root user:

     

      1. OS X Mountain Lion: Enable and disable the root user

      2. OS X Lion: Enable and disable the root user

      3. Mac OS X 10.6: Enabling the root user

      4. Enabling and using the "root" user in Mac OS X

     

    After enabling the root user, and logging in under this account, again open Keychain Access. First attempt repairs using Keychain First Aid, and failing that, delete then recreate the keychain as described above while logged in as root.

     

    Persistently asked for stored passwords If you are persistently asked for passwords in various applications that you have specified should be remembered in a keychain, your "login" keychain may not be active for one reason or another.

     

    Navigate to ~/Library/Keychains/ (this is the Library folder inside your user's home folder). Find the file named "login.keychain" and double-click it.

     

    Failing that, select the "login" keychain within the Keychain Access application and make sure it is the default keychain by going to the "File" menu and selecting "Make 'Login' Default"

     

    Turn off Keychain synchronization in applications having problems If specific applications are experiencing issues when accessing password-protected material, the Keychain may be to blame.

     

    The above comes from an article published on MacFixit.com.

  • by Barney-15E,Solvedanswer

    Barney-15E Barney-15E Feb 27, 2015 7:23 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1
    Level 9 (50,072 points)
    Mac OS X
    Feb 27, 2015 7:23 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1
  • by Linc Davis,Helpful

    Linc Davis Linc Davis Feb 27, 2015 7:32 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1
    Level 10 (207,963 points)
    Applications
    Feb 27, 2015 7:32 PM in response to Benjamin Smith1
  • by Benjamin Smith1,

    Benjamin Smith1 Benjamin Smith1 Feb 28, 2015 6:58 AM in response to Kappy
    Level 1 (135 points)
    Feb 28, 2015 6:58 AM in response to Kappy

    Tried the first stuff - but wouldn't let me unlock the local items keychain so that I could delete it!   Deleting the file in the next answer worked

  • by kgaston614,

    kgaston614 kgaston614 Nov 27, 2015 9:22 AM in response to Kappy
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Nov 27, 2015 9:22 AM in response to Kappy

    Thank you so much for your post.

     

    I was having this issue as well, forgotten password for Local Items.  Your answer was spot on!