Reset Home Folder permissions and ACLs Error

As an addendum: These are examples of the error messages I'm getting. Opening images in preview tells me I don't have permission to view it. Whilst trying to open images I get 'verifying' task bar and when I take a screenshot and then try to preview it in preview I get a similar error message.

What is the underlying problem that caused you to think you needed to repair permissions on the home folder?

That task usually doesn't take very long to complete.

I'm not sure what would happen, but if it has been going that long, I don't think it is actually doing anything.

Hi Linc,

I'm having a similar issue with my MBP

I think the issue started after trying to rename the home folder or the user account to something different to the computer name (or it could be related to moving files around using iCloud).

Either way, there's a whole folder of images which I cannot open and which give me permission errors. I've tried LOTS of different things to try to resolve the problems, including reinstalling the OS, renaming the hard-drive, renaming my admin user account, resetting ACLs, repairing permissions etc. none of which worked.

I entered

find ~ $TMPDIR.. \( -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 -o -acl \) 2> /dev/null | wc -l

into the terminal however, and got this number in response: 49

Could you please help me identify and solve the problem? I'd really value your input.

Thank you

Best wishes

Richard

Linc is no longer here. Since his commands were purposely obfuscated, it is hard to be certain, but common sense would imply that it should be run as the user who has the problem. Since it uses sudo, that user must have admin privileges.

Assuming the files are inside your Home folder, try this:

Resolve issues caused by changing the permissions of items in your home folder - Apple Support

Problems such as yours are sometimes caused by files that should belong to you but are locked or have wrong permissions. This procedure will check for such files. It makes no changes and therefore will not, in itself, solve your problem.

First, empty the Trash.

Triple-click the line below on this page to select it, then copy the selected text to the Clipboard (command-C):

find ~ $TMPDIR.. \( -flags +sappnd,schg,uappnd,uchg -o ! -user $UID -o ! -perm -600 -o -acl \) 2> /dev/null | wc -l

Launch the Terminal application in any of the following ways:

☞ Enter the first few letters of its name into a Spotlight search. Select it in the results (it should be at the top.)

☞ In the Finder, select Go ▹ Utilities from the menu bar, or press the key combination shift-command-U. The application is in the folder that opens.

☞ Open LaunchPad. Click Utilities, then Terminal in the icon grid.

Paste into the Terminal window (command-V). The command may take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign (“$”) to appear.

The output of this command, on a line directly below what you entered, will be a number such as "41." Please post it in a reply.

Back up all data. Don't continue unless you're sure you can restore from a backup, even if you're unable to log in.

This procedure will unlock all your user files (not system files) and reset their ownership and access-control lists to the default. If you've set special values for those attributes on any of your files, they will be reverted. In that case, either stop here, or be prepared to recreate the settings if necessary. Do so only after verifying that those settings didn't cause the problem. If none of this is meaningful to you, you don't need to worry about it.

Step 1

If you have more than one user account, and the one in question is not an administrator account, then temporarily promote it to administrator status in the Users & Groups preference pane. To do that, unlock the preference pane using the credentials of an administrator, check the box marked Allow user to administer this computer, then reboot. You can demote the problem account back to standard status when this step has been completed.

Enter the following command in the Terminal window in the same way as before (triple-click, copy, and paste):

{ sudo chflags -R nouchg,nouappnd ~ $TMPDIR.. ; sudo chown -R $UID:staff ~ $_ ; sudo chmod -R u+rwX ~ $_ ; chmod -R -N ~ $_ ; } 2> /dev/null

This time you'll be prompted for your login password, which won't be displayed when you type it. You may get a one-time warning to be careful. If you don’t have a login password, you’ll need to set one before you can run the command. If you see a message that your username "is not in the sudoers file," then you're not logged in as an administrator.

The command will take a noticeable amount of time to run. Wait for a new line ending in a dollar sign (“$”) to appear, then quit Terminal.

Step 2 (optional)

Take this step only if you have trouble with Step 1 or if it doesn't solve the problem.

Boot into Recovery. When the OS X Utilities screen appears, select

Utilities ▹ Terminal

from the menu bar. A Terminal window will open.

In the Terminal window, type this:

res

Press the tab key. The partial command you typed will automatically be completed to this:

resetpassword

Press return. A Reset Password window will open. You’re not going to reset a password.

Select your boot volume ("Macintosh HD," unless you gave it a different name) if not already selected.

Select your username from the menu labeled Select the user account if not already selected.

Under Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACLs, click the Reset button.

Select

 ▹ Restart

from the menu bar.

Thanks for the kind words.

A MBP was recently returned to us from a past employee. The password he's given us have not been working. I just tried your notes on reseting the PW. Now, when I login, the user folders are all empty. So, if somehow I am able to figure out what the old password was and If we updated the keychain using these steps:

1. Open Keychain Access located in Applications > Utilities.
2. From the Edit menu, choose: Change Password for Keychain "login"…
3. Type the previous password, then click OK.
4. If the correct password is entered, a new window appears. Enter the original password again in the Current Password field.
5. In the New Password field, type the password that matches the current account password.
6. Re-enter the newer password in the Verify field, then click OK.

Would that return access to all the user files?

Would that return access to all the user files?

The keychain has nothing to do with access to user files. It is a secure password database.

Did the previous employee erase all of the data prior to returning it?

Thankl you for your response.

Regarding your question, I don't know. I don't think he would have erased anything. Do I have any other options?

Log in as another user and look to see if there is anything in his old Home folder. It is in /Users.

If there is nothing in the home subfolders, then it was all erased. If it is important enough to spend a few hundred dollars, you might be able to get a recovery service to recover it.

If you don't have another user, you can boot the Mac into Firewire Target Disk Mode and connect it to another Mac. The Target Disk Mode mac will show up as a hard drive on the other Mac. You can then poke around to find the data, if it exists. To boot into Target Disk Mode, hold down the T key on restart. You will see a firewire symbol on the screen. It is now acting like a hard disk.

If the Mac doesn't have a Firewire port, you may need a Thunderbolt to Firewire conversion cable. Cable configuration will depend on what kind of port the TDM Mac has, and what the othe Mac has. You can get Firewire cables to go 800 to 800, 800 to 400, and Thunderbolt to 800.