I am having some very spooky problems with file sharing. The tale is a bit long so bear with me.
I have two computers with El Capitan. An older iMac with HFS+ on the main drive and a new external drive with 3 partitions (Extended, Journaled, Case-sensitive).
I enabled file sharing to share the external drive for my laptop's backups. The list of folders shared has 4 entries that are not configured as shared from the iMac. That there is the core symptom I want to address.
How did I get into this state? Well, ...
When I started the task of enabling file sharing, I hit a very strange problem that no longer happens. I hit the +, selected a directory -- nothing happened. Repeat same steps like an idiot. Out of frustration, I add things I didn't want to share: home directory, root directory, other partitions.
After quitting System Preferences, I reopened to be greeted by "Preference Error: Could not load sharing preference pane".
Quit and try again, add folder to sharing, unlike before, folder added to the list.
Now I go to the laptop to look at the list of shared folders, the 3 I expect to see and 4 extra when the software wasn't working properly. Keep in mind these items are not in the list of configured folders. There are no entries to select and remove.
I have disabled and reenabled. Rebooted. Run disk tool.
In a shell, searched the entire disk looking for sharing config. Using names and timestamps to guide my search.
In finder, using command-I to view and change info, one can enable and disable sharing of a folder. No change to the exported list.
I am at the point where I might erase the whole disk and install the OS fresh. But, I am afraid that restoring from Time Machine will stick me back into this crazy bug.
