pingpong9

Q: messed up computer (10.9.4) after migration to SSD - permissions or java problem?

thanks in advance for reading!  I have a doozy:  I moved my hdd to my optibay and installed a new SSD into my main hdd bay (mbp late 2011)

transferred data from hdd to ssd using superduper

so the ssd is now a clone of the old hdd (and in the same place as the old hdd) and the ssd is the startup

BUT

seems permissions are wonky?

not sure what it is.  possibly java is a problem -- maybe via permissions?

 

here's the symptoms:

browsers/finder work great (faster with ssd)

but MANY apps just wont load or are wonky.

bluestacks won't load-- wont even get to the "loading" animation...  (have re-installed numerous times)

metasearch on vuze won't work -- I see it for 7 seconds and then it vanishes.

other apps wont load -- the problem seems to be java related maybe?  I'm not clear.

 

steps I've taken to resolve:

(all did nothin)

re-installed every app that wasn't working (ug!  endless!  appcleaner etc!  hard to say how far they were uninstalled but seemed pretty thorough)

 

re-installed OSX 10.9.4

 

repaired permissions in a few ways on ssd

 

even "Reset Home Folder permissions and ACLs"  via rebooting with cmnd+r

 

downgraded to java 6 (did nothin) then back up to java 7 (nothin)

erased all the java caches etc I could find

 

now I'm not really sure WHAT is going on here -- but my suspicion is that there's something funny about the superduper migration and permissions  (everything was working when I upgraded to 10.9 a month ago)

I noticed: when I open a lot of folders, like utilities etc, they're read-only.  huh?  I don't think that was true, before.

to fix this I made the possible mistake of GetInfo/giving read-write privileges to everyone and "applied to enclosed items"

maybe that was dumb?

either way, after rebooting and repairing permissions, it seems the read-only structure of much of the new ssd is back

(I'm logged in as my main account as always -- is this not root? I'm never clear on root stuff...) (with mavericks, before the migration, I was able to run all these apps fine.  but none of these odd "read-only" icons were showing up in my folders)

so maybe bad permissions -- or bad java -- is the reason apps won't connect to the internet?  sometimes they crash when running animations.

 

ANY help would be so appreciated!  already wasted many full days on this!  ack! 

Posted on Jul 3, 2014 8:11 PM

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Q: messed up computer (10.9.4) after migration to SSD - permissions or java problem?

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  • by pingpong9,

    pingpong9 pingpong9 Jul 6, 2014 5:20 PM in response to dianeoforegon
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 6, 2014 5:20 PM in response to dianeoforegon

    no word from linc davis -- tried to find him on other pages, but he must be super busy....

     

    >Not sure if this will work, but I'll try posting Linc's profile link and see if the forum sends a followup email.

    https://discussions.apple.com/people/Linc%20Davis

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Jul 6, 2014 5:44 PM in response to pingpong9
    Level 7 (23,613 points)
    Safari
    Jul 6, 2014 5:44 PM in response to pingpong9

    Using chmod 777 is a sledge-hammer and will not address ACLs, so my recommendation is to avoid it and use it as a last resort.

     

    In Disk Utility, if you look at the SSD drive, you have Verify and Repair Permissions. This can fix permissions on OSX specific files.

     

    DU-Permissions.png

     

    Using Get Info and giving your User the privileges may be tedious, but safer and better on a per application basis. It will also help you catalog applications which may require Mavericks-compatible versions to be downloaded and re-installed. In cases where you re-install, it may be worth dragging the old application(s) into Trash (your Seagate/SL version already has a backup) before it gets replaced. It can clean up data which may otherwise cause problems for the newer versions.

  • by pingpong9,

    pingpong9 pingpong9 Jul 6, 2014 7:43 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 6, 2014 7:43 PM in response to Loner T

    you rock, LT.

    the crazy things about re-installing apps is that I HAVE erased every shred of these apps I can find.  and yet, when I re-install -- still problems.

  • by pingpong9,

    pingpong9 pingpong9 Jul 6, 2014 7:44 PM in response to Loner T
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 6, 2014 7:44 PM in response to Loner T

    re: permissions: I've "repaired permissions" on the ssd many times.  and yet... many strange folders are now set to "read-only" -- ?  huh?

     

    also, as I explore the apps that are broken: I found:

    everything in the folder  private/var/db is "read-only".  seems reasonable with the "private" moniker -- but it also contains some files that are connected to apps that are malfunctioning (and many that aren't, tho)

     

    can I apply "read/write" permissions (via getinfo) to  a folder like "private" and survive?  what about applying the new read/write rules to the "enclosed contents"?  (a lot of files)

     

    what's safe to put the read/write priviledges?

    ....the entire utilities folder?  (dunno why that's now read-only...)

    ....the Library file?   the User/Library file?

    I'd like to unlock as much as possible and make it all read-write, but I don't wanna mess up more stuff...

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Jul 7, 2014 4:25 AM in response to pingpong9
    Level 7 (23,613 points)
    Safari
    Jul 7, 2014 4:25 AM in response to pingpong9

    The Permissions buttons in DU do not (and cannot fix Application permissions).

     

    My recommendation is to pick a specific application and change only it's files as a test before you do it globally.

     

    Here is a list of /private/var/db on my MBP. (and I am not running into any issues. This was the reason for trying to get files and ports from activity monitor to see if any files looked strange).

     

    ls -l /private/var/db/

    total 2120

    -r--------    1 root        wheel             0 Sep 29  2013 BootCache.data

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel        108508 Jul  2 10:57 BootCache.playlist

    drwxr-xr-x    8 root        wheel           272 Jul  2 10:56 BootCaches

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        admin          4598 Oct 31  2013 CodeEquivalenceCandidates

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel         16384 Jul  2 10:56 CodeEquivalenceDatabase

    drwxr-xr-x    6 root        wheel           204 Feb  8 09:54 ConfigurationProfiles

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel             0 Feb  7 21:19 DetachedSignatures

    drwxr-xr-x    3 root        wheel           102 Oct 31  2013 FIPS

    drwxr-xr-x    2 root        wheel            68 Sep 12  2013 GPURestartReporter

    drwxrwxr-x    2 root        admin            68 Jun 15 10:22 PanicReporter

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel           283 Oct 31  2013 PartNumber.plist

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel           237 Oct 31  2013 QuickTimePlayerVersion.plist

    drwxr-xr-x    2 root        wheel            68 Sep 12  2013 ServerPerfLogClients

    drwx------    2 root        wheel            68 Oct 31  2013 Spotlight

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel            20 Jul  7 07:09 SystemEntropyCache

    -r--------    1 root        wheel            48 Oct 31  2013 SystemKey

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel        217088 Jul  4 09:59 SystemPolicy

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel           229 Mar 22 17:05 SystemPolicy-prefs.plist

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel        126976 Mar 22 19:57 auth.db

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel         32768 Jul  3 06:36 auth.db-shm

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel         37112 Mar 22 19:57 auth.db-wal

    drwxr-xr-x    3 root        wheel           102 Sep 12  2013 caches

    drwxrwxrwx    2 root        wheel            68 Jun 14 08:32 com.apple.backupd.backupVerification

    drwxr-xr-x   26 root        wheel           884 Jul  7 07:14 crls

    drwx------    4 root        wheel           136 Apr 10 17:05 dhcpclient

    drwxr-xr-x    3 root        wheel           102 May 16 08:45 displaypolicyd

    drwxr-xr-x    3 root        wheel           102 Sep 12  2013 dslocal

    -rw-------    1 root        wheel        350335 Jul  5 08:54 dslocal-backup.xar

    drwxr-xr-x    7 root        wheel           238 May 22 07:42 dyld

    drwxr-xr-x    3 root        wheel           102 Feb  8 09:13 efw_cache

    drwxr-xr-x    2 root        wheel            68 Sep 12  2013 emondClients

    drwxr-x---    2 _geod       _geod            68 Sep 12  2013 geod

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel        297813 Oct 31  2013 gke.auth

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel             0 Sep 12  2013 gke.sigs

    -rw-r-----    1 root        wheel            53 Jul  5 09:01 kcm-dump.bin

    -rw-r-----    1 root        wheel            16 Jul  3 06:36 kcm-dump.uuid

    drwxr-xr-x   17 root        wheel           578 Jun 25 12:11 launchd.db

    drwxr-x---    4 _locationd  _locationd      136 Feb  1 11:07 locationd

    drwxrwxrwx    6 _usbmuxd    _usbmuxd        204 Apr 13 15:01 lockdown

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel            21 Jul  7 07:09 logsyswrites

    drwxr-xr-x    4 root        wheel           136 Feb  1 11:01 mds

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel             8 Jul  4 02:08 ntp.drift

    drwxr-xr-x    4 root        wheel           136 Sep 13  2013 openldap

    drwxr-xr-x  898 root        wheel         30532 Jul  3 12:49 receipts

    drwxr-xr-x   24 root        wheel           816 May 22 07:42 spindump

    drwx------    3 root        wheel           102 Feb 10 08:27 sudo

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel       1391578 Oct 31  2013 systempaths.plist

    drwxr-xr-x  256 root        wheel          8704 Jul  7 07:11 systemstats

    drwxr-xr-x    6 root        wheel           204 Jul  5 09:01 vmware

    -rw-r--r--    1 root        wheel            54 Feb 10 20:37 volinfo.database

  • by andyBall_uk,

    andyBall_uk andyBall_uk Jul 7, 2014 5:30 AM in response to pingpong9
    Level 7 (20,495 points)
    Jul 7, 2014 5:30 AM in response to pingpong9

    Read-only, even for Admin users, is normal on the folders you've mentioned; except for the user's own Library.

    Are there any standard Apple Applications which aren't working ?. Any others not in beta testing, & well-known to work with Mavericks ?.

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Jul 7, 2014 6:30 AM in response to pingpong9
    Level 7 (23,613 points)
    Safari
    Jul 7, 2014 6:30 AM in response to pingpong9

    You may also want to consider using something like this - http://roaringapps.com.

  • by pingpong9,

    pingpong9 pingpong9 Jul 7, 2014 2:28 PM in response to andyBall_uk
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Jul 7, 2014 2:28 PM in response to andyBall_uk

    read-only for the utilities folder?  I don't remember that in my last setup.

    read-only for the entire user folder?

     

    and: re: the malfunctioning apps -- all are non-standard apple, yes -- but again, they all worked on mavericks with the old setup/ before the drives were moved...

     

    any idea how to re-install SWT?  I'm not sure what that is but it keeps coming up

  • by Loner T,

    Loner T Loner T Jul 7, 2014 8:03 PM in response to pingpong9
    Level 7 (23,613 points)
    Safari
    Jul 7, 2014 8:03 PM in response to pingpong9

    Are your referring to this https://www.eclipse.org/swt/ when you talk about SWT? If yes, you can download a new version and install it.

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