Alert Message upon Startup-OS 10.2.6 ?

[kps]

There's a OS X process called autodiskmount which runs at login to mount all partitions, external disks, removable disks etc. The process runs as root, ie. owned by root. It also mounts any removable media that the user may insert after login or startup. It's always on, so to speak.

Your thread got me curious about some of the processes and so I created a non-admin user (karlito) and experimented a little.

It's a pretty strange message to be given if it was just a plain old permissions issue. If it was, then it should have said so..."Hey, you have no permission to mount this file system"...know what I mean?

So I wanted to see what the difference in permissions was going to be between me and karlito, below is a list of my mounted disks:

--OS X, OS 9, swap and MasterX are on my master drive

--Darcy and Trish are on the internal slave drive

--Fire1 & 2 are on an external Firewire drive

--CD002 is a backup CD-R

Have a look at the permissions and Owner and Group when logged in as me (karl) and the non admin user I created (karlito)

Me:

CODE

[KARCOM:/Volumes] karl% ls -al
total 0
drwxrwxrwt  10 root  wheel     340 Jun 10 16:27 .
drwxrwxr-t  32 root  admin    1088 Jun  8 22:49 ..
drwxrwxrwx  20 karl  unknown   680 Sep 30  2000 CD-002
drwxrwxrwx  61 karl  staff    2074 Jun 10 16:26 Darcy
drwxrwxrwx  29 karl  unknown   986 Jun 10 16:26 Fire1
drwxrwxr-t  41 karl  unknown  1394 Jun 10 16:26 Fire2
drwxrwxrwx  15 karl  unknown   510 Jun 10 16:26 OS9
drwxrwxrwx  21 karl  staff     714 Jun 10 16:26 Trish
drwxrwxrwx  16 karl  unknown   544 Jun 10 16:26 masterX
drwxrwxrwx  11 karl  unknown   374 Jun 10 16:26 swap

and now karlito:

CODE

[KARCOM:/Volumes] karlito% ls -al
total 0
drwxrwxrwt  10 root     wheel     340 Jun 10 16:23 .
drwxrwxr-t  32 root     admin    1088 Jun  8 22:49 ..
drwxrwxrwx  20 karlito  unknown   680 Sep 30  2000 CD-002
drwxrwxrwx  61 karl     staff    2074 May 20 10:07 Darcy
drwxrwxrwx  29 karlito  unknown   986 May 19 11:18 Fire1
drwxrwxr-t  41 karlito  unknown  1394 May 19 11:18 Fire2
drwxrwxrwx  15 karlito  unknown   510 May 29 22:41 OS9
drwxrwxrwx  21 karl     staff     714 May 29 22:41 Trish
drwxrwxrwx  16 karlito  unknown   544 Jun 10 15:14 masterX
drwxrwxrwx  11 karlito  unknown   374 May 29 22:41 swap

Interestingly, the permissions for the disks remain the same. All except in one case, the ownership changes to the logged in user. Both partitions on the slave drive remained owned by me when logged in as karlito. Groups remained the same in both cases.

So, if autodiskmount was working properly on your system then Sam should not have had any problems mounting both your partitions and the second drive. What else was trying to mount is beyond me.

I have no idea what caused the problem...was it permissions, corrupted cache, corrupted prefs or maybe the file system needed repair? The login daemon is an application which logs you in...that could have had a corrupt preference or cache. Only Apple knows for sure.

Glad you got it fixed.

[Gary S]

Thanks a lot Karl for going through what you did.

I always hope your dropping in when OSX starts to act up.

What would we do without your help.

I need to learn a lot about permissions. I think I may have forgotten to change some folders back or something.

Say goodby to Kalito for me if you get a chance.

[kps]

No big deal Gary, I'm still learning myself...it's kind'a fun.

I put this permissions page together a while back if you care to read it.

It would have been easier if you backed up Sam's home directory and then deleted the account. That, I believe, would have preserved the ownership.

[Gary S]

Thanks Kps!

I bookmarked it and will go through it and see if it sinks in.

[Bill]

I already had Karls link. Didn't kick in (memory thing) to post it.