Can't change permissions

See the following:

*To fix the /Users folder*:

sudo chown root:admin /Users

To fix Home folder permissions:

sudo chown -R `id -un`:`id -gn` ~

Press RETURN. You will be prompted to enter your admin password which will not be echoed.

You need to first make the /Users folder before you can make the /Users/Shared folder. You don't need the Shared folder.

If you have no /Users folder how are you logging onto the machine? I'm missing something here. What I suggested did not involve any commands relating to /Users/Shared.

The Users folder is at the root where the Applications, Library, and System folders are located. Looks to me that if you have trashed your Users folder then you have also trashed your account. I think you will need to reinstall OS X. You should be able to do that as follows:

How to Perform an Archive and Install

An Archive and Install will NOT erase your hard drive, but you must have sufficient free space for a second OS X installation which could be from 3-9 GBs depending upon the version of OS X and selected installation options. The free space requirement is over and above normal free space requirements which should be at least 6-10 GBs. Read all the linked references carefully before proceeding.

1. Be sure to use Disk Utility first to repair the disk before performing the Archive and Install.

Repairing the Hard Drive and Permissions

Boot from your Leopard Installer disc. After the installer loads select your language and click on the Continue button. When the menu bar appears select Disk Utility from the Installer menu (Utilities menu for Tiger, Leopard or Snow Leopard.) After DU loads select your hard drive entry (mfgr.'s ID and drive size) from the the left side list. In the DU status area you will see an entry for the S.M.A.R.T. status of the hard drive. If it does not say "Verified" then the hard drive is failing or failed. (SMART status is not reported on external Firewire or USB drives.) If the drive is "Verified" then select your OS X volume from the list on the left (sub-entry below the drive entry,) click on the First Aid tab, then click on the Repair Disk button. If DU reports any errors that have been fixed, then re-run Repair Disk until no errors are reported. If no errors are reported click on the Repair Permissions button. Wait until the operation completes, then quit DU and return to the installer. If all is well quit DU and return to the installer. Proceed to the next step.

If DU reports errors it cannot fix, then you will need Disk Warrior and/or Tech Tool Pro to repair the drive. If you don't have either of them or if neither of them can fix the drive, then you will need to reformat the drive and reinstall OS X.

2. Do not proceed with an Archive and Install if DU reports errors it cannot fix. In that case use Disk Warrior and/or TechTool Pro to repair the hard drive. If neither can repair the drive, then you will have to erase the drive and reinstall from scratch.

3. When you reach the screen to select a destination drive click once on the destination drive then click on the Option button. Select the Archive and Install option. You have an option to preserve users and network preferences. Only select this option if you are sure you have no corrupted files in your user accounts. (*In your case do not check this option since you have no user accounts*.) Otherwise leave this option unchecked. Click on the OK button and continue with the OS X Installation.

4. Upon completion of the Archive and Install you will have a Previous System Folder in the root directory. You should retain the PSF until you are sure you do not need to manually transfer any items from the PSF to your newly installed system.

5. After moving any items you want to keep from the PSF you should delete it. You can back it up if you prefer, but you must delete it from the hard drive.

6. You can now download a Combo Updater directly from Apple's download site to update your new system to the desired version as well as install any security or other updates. You can also do this using Software Update.

Most likely the Users folder and user accounts were on a network drive.

You can make a folder visible: sudo chflags nohidden /pathto/foldername. But that's won't solve your problem necessarily. One can still operate on invisible files using sudo. But in your case you may need to be 'root' to get anything done. Try booting into single-user mode. At the prompt enter:

/sbin/mount -uw /

This will set the filesystem to write mode.

You may have better luck using /Volumes/HDD Name/Users. Have you tried just doing ls to see if the Users folder is present - ls / - that's ls space forward slash.

If you boot into single-user mode you can do everything the same except that you will have 'root' status, so you don't need to use 'sudo.'

What do you see if you do:

ls /Users

while in single-user mode?

I can see the contents of a Home folder. I can see that a Users folder is present at the root level. But you did not do the above to see what's in the /Users folder.

Now if you use ls -al you should get a listing that includes the current privileges assigned for each directory entry. In particular:

ls -al /Users/*
and
ls -al /Users

The default privileges for the /Users folder are:

Owner=system with r/w
Group=admin with r/o
Everyone with r/o

The default privileges of a user's account:

Owner=username with r/w
Group=staff with r/o or r/w
Everyone with r/o

I guess I made an assumption I should not have. When you enter - chflags nohidden /Volumes/HDD Name/Users - if there are any spaces in the device name you need to enclose the path in quotes, e.g., chflags no hidden "/Volumes/HDD Name/Users".

It appears no user account is listed. I'm thinking you can try something that I'm not sure will work.

See, How to Reset Back to Setup Assistant.

If this works then when you reboot you'll go through the Setup Assistant where you can create a new user account.

David,

I'm not really sure. This is getting into new territory for me.

Before going further let me see if I can get someone over here that would know the right thing to do.