somanna
Level 1 (114 points)
Mac OS X

Q: What is 'Permissions differ...'?

Of late I am facing some problems in my Mac's performance. I have had to resort to using Disk utility for gauging the status of the Mac's HD and on both occasions, I found that there was this problem which came up under 'verify disk permissions' : permissions differ...[see screenshot, if this could help in diagnosing what the problem is]:

 

Screen Shot 2012-11-28 at 10.37.01 PM.png

 

Of late I have been going to different sites on the net such as news and You Tube and is this problem related to such internet related issues? I would like to be enlightened in this matter since I have not experienced this problem earlier.

iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.5), garage band, FCPX:10.0.6 version

Posted on Nov 28, 2012 9:21 AM

Close
somanna

Q: What is 'Permissions differ...'?

  • All replies
  • Helpful answers

  • by Klaus1,Helpful

    Klaus1 Klaus1 Nov 28, 2012 9:49 AM in response to somanna
    Level 8 (48,918 points)
    Nov 28, 2012 9:49 AM in response to somanna

    Whilst there is little point in using 'verify permissions' (you might as well go straight to 'repair permissions'), you can in fact ignore these messages:

     

    As long as the report ends up with 'Permissions repair complete' then, as far as permissions go, you are fine. You can ignore the various statements in the report:

     

    Permissions you can ignore on 10.5 onwards:

     

    http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1448

     

    Using 'should be -rw-r--r-- , they are lrw-r--r--' as an example, you will see the that the permissions are not changed, but the | indicates a different location. This is because an update to Leopard onwards changed the location of a number of system components.

     

    Poster rccharles has provided this description of what it all means:

     

    drwxrwxrwx
     
    d = directory


    r = read

    w = write


    x = executeable program

     

    drwxrwxrwx

    |  |  |

    |  |   all other users not in first two types

    |  | 

    |  group

    | 

    owner


    a little more info

    Before the user had read & write. A member of the group had read.

    After, only the user had read & write.

  • by somanna,

    somanna somanna Nov 28, 2012 4:06 PM in response to Klaus1
    Level 1 (114 points)
    Mac OS X
    Nov 28, 2012 4:06 PM in response to Klaus1

    Thanks a lot Klaus for your reply. So this apparent malfunctioning of the Mac's HD is not a cause for concern and I just need to, with peace of mind, click on the repair permissions button and move ahead. Is this understanding of mine correct?

     

    BTW, let me tell you why I had suspected my Mac's HD to be having some problem and why I had sought to use disk utility services: several months ago, I found  gray line appear on my Mac during startup. I raised this matter in these forums: [https://discussions.apple.com/message/18744385#18744385]

     

    Recently, when the gray line resurfaced after a great gap, I resorted to the services of disk utility and understood that there was a permissions related problem. This problem appears solved for now.

     

    I guess that a stitch in time is better than 9 stitches made out of time!