Simple guide to Sharing & Permissions - does it exist?

Question

Simple guide to Sharing & Permissions - does it exist?

I have an external drive, and I want to be the only user account who can read/write/view the folders.

I have set up one folder with <My account name> with privilege "Read & Write" and also <Everyone? with privilege "No access".

With a second folder I have set up the same privileges.

HOWEVER - all users can access the first folder, and NOBODY (not even me!) can access the second one - the second one has a 'No entry' sign on the icon.

Neither is giving me what I want - and they are giving me 2 different results!

To me, the above permissions should only let me (Alasdair) open the folders and read/write the contents.

I'm not asking for a solution here (unless you have one :) but are there any resources which will explain this to me - I've searched the Apple Support site and wider internet to no avail. I don't want to get into command line stuff.

Thanks in advance!

Mac mini, macOS 12.6

Posted on Sep 27, 2022 12:09 PM

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Answer 1

Barney-15E

Level 10

117,556 points

Sep 27, 2022 12:16 PM in response to Alasdair Mackie1

How is the drive formatted?

I don’t see the ignore ownership checkbox at the bottom of your get info window, which makes me think it is some windows format. Any of the FAT formats do not have permissions so regardless of what you set up you don’t get that.

but, it makes me wonder why you have no access to the other folder.

I don’t know if there is any sort of a guide anywhere, but you can search for UNIX POSIX permissions and access control lists.

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Answer 2

Sep 27, 2022 12:27 PM in response to Barney-15E

It’s an APFS formatted SSD.

The ignore ownership bit IS there, perhaps dark mode doesn’t show it as clearly.

I don’t want to delve too deeply into UNIX commands etc, so might just leave things as they are. Its the inconsistency which puzzles me,

Thanks

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Answer 3

Sep 28, 2022 1:10 AM in response to Barney-15E

At same level - top level of drive.

I realise they are based on UNIX but I just thought (hoped) using the Mac OS level controls would be easy, obvious and straightforward .... IIRC it uses CHMOD at the UNIX level, but I don't want to accidentally cause more harm!

What is odd is that I can't find an idiots guide to how to use them.

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Answer 4

Barney-15E

Level 10

117,556 points

Sep 27, 2022 2:54 PM in response to Alasdair Mackie1

Are they at the same level on the drive, or is one inside the other.

I don’t want to delve too deeply into UNIX commands etc,

That's what they are.

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Simple guide to Sharing & Permissions - does it exist?

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