Keychain Menu Bar options...

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Level 2

284 points

Keychain Menu Bar options...

If you go into Applications>Utilities>Keychain Access and then select Preferences from the Menu Bar, you can enable the KeyChain Access Menu Bar icon.

Wfter enabling the menubar for KeyChain Access you will see 4 easill-accessible security options:
1. Lock Screen
2. Lock All KeyChains
3. Lock Keychains "login"
4. Unlock Keychain "FileVaultMaster"

#1 & #2 make sense to me. Does anyone know what #3 & #4 do?

1.2 GHz 12 PowerBook G4, 1.25GB RAM, 60GB HD, Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Posted on Nov 29, 2005 11:00 PM

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Answer 1

Nov 30, 2005 5:18 AM in response to Mark Brooks1

You can have multiple keychains. So, in addition to option #2 that locks all keychains, you also have options for locking/unlocking each individual keychain. On my machine I have two other keychains that I've created and I've got options for each of those on my menu.

Your "main" keychain that gets created when you create an account is called "login.keychain". That's your "default" keychain and it's where keychain entries will typically go. Hence, option #3.

I'm not using FileVault, so I don't see option #4, but I assume if you've turned on FileVault that's what causes it to be added to the menu.

I'm not quite sure what the effect of locking FileVaultMaster would be, but I suppose it would lock your encrypted home folder causing you to be prompted for your password before you could access anything in it.

Steve

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Answer 2

Mark Brooks1 Author

Level 2

284 points

Nov 30, 2005 1:34 PM in response to Steve Herman1

thanks for the reply....but I don't have filevault enabled either regarding option #4.

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