Repairing Permissions is not necesary?

If anyone can help guide me or shed light on this situation with my computer and Apple tech support I would appreciate it.

Here is the story.

I have a G5 dual 2, 2 gig of ram and everything else is stock.

Recenty I upgraded to 10.4.3. I repaired permissions and had a clean slate. I upgraded. Upon repairing permissions I got a slew of them. I repaired and no go. Always the same. Called Apple Tech support. They told me after going thru every option they had that I would have to start clean. So I did. I used copy clone (thank goodness) and even wrote zero's all over the disk several times. Then did a from scratch reinstall.

Couldn't believe it. THE SAME LIST OF ITEMS APPEARS in the repair list. Cannot be gotten rid off. So Back to Apple tech support. The main tech after trying the a few things says he has to bump me upstairs. HE HAS NEVER SEEN THIS ETC>

So the new tech guy comes on. He doesn't try to fix anything, he just tells me this.

ITS NOT A PROBLEM. PEOPLE MAKE TO MUCH OUT OF IT.

I responded,.. was that" really" true. Because I follow the LAFCPUG, and its always recommended to repair permissions on a regular basis etc.

The tech responded with, "I DON'T WORK WITH FCP,..etc etc, He again tells me that this is not a problem, but this time he throws in a caveat. IT WOULD ONLY BE A PROBLEM IF IT STARTS TO EFFECT YOUR FILES THAT DEAL WITH THOSE PERMSISSIONS ETC. his tone of voice was "rude" also when he mention FCP (different set of guys he says). His tone was bare civil most of the time. He was taking a "hard line" from the get go. So I went from a regular tech support that had never seen this problem, to its not a problem. Yet they had me wipe my disk. So my tone was one of hard line right back. When I listed the litany of this machine (he had the history already from my case files) and that I was going to come to this forum and post what he said about repairing permissions AT THIS WEB SITE. He seemed to "sit back". and didn't say anything. Then I went for the kill. WHats your name ALLEN he replied. Whats my case number, I asked. He replied, its the same one. I replied no, Allen I want you to give me the case number. He then "reluctantly" read off the number for me. Which I of course had to reconfirm at least threee times.

Well this all seems pretty weak to me. WHY, because I wish to expand this system to edit non compressed NTSC and DVPRO HD and Jpeg HD etc. Not noncompressed HD (at this time).

Is this guy blowing smoke up my skirt.

By the way its not a small list of permissions.

here it is, and this is why I am so concerned about the integrity of this machine.

Repairing permissions for ?Macintosh HD?
Determining correct file permissions.
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/Dictionary.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/Dictionary.widgetplugin/Contents/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/Dictionary.widgetplugin/Contents/MacOS/Dictionary. New permissions are 33261
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/Dictionary.widgetplugin/Contents/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Dictionary.wdgt/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/FlightTracker.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/FlightTrackerComboBoxPlugin.plugin/Contents/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/FlightTrackerComboBoxPlugin.plugin/Contents/MacOS/FlightTrackerComboBoxPlugin. New permissions are 33261
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/FlightTrackerComboBoxPlugin.plugin/Contents/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/parser.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Flight Tracker.wdgt/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Stickies.wdgt/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Stickies.wdgt/Stickies.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Stickies.wdgt/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Unit Converter.wdgt/Info.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Unit Converter.wdgt/UnitConverter.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Unit Converter.wdgt/parser.js. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets/Unit Converter.wdgt/version.plist. New permissions are 33188
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./Library/Widgets. New permissions are 16877
We are using a special gid for the file or directory ./System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/MacOS/Dock. New gid is 0
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./System/Library/CoreServices/Dock.app/Contents/MacOS/Dock. New permissions are 33261
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./usr/lib/php/build/Makefile.global. New permissions are 33060
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./usr/lib/php/build/acinclude.m4. New permissions are 33060
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./usr/lib/php/build/mkdep.awk. New permissions are 33060
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./usr/lib/php/build/phpize.m4. New permissions are 33060
We are using special permissions for the file or directory ./usr/lib/php/build/scan_makefile_in.awk. New permissions are 33060

Permissions repair complete
The privileges have been verified or repaired on the selected volume


Same list every time.


This is my suspicion. This is one of the first G5's. One with the first chip set, that was discontinued and a new manufactor was started. Isn't that correct on the history.

The history of this machine is not good. It has been in and out of the shop several times.

Replaced the optical drive. (crashing and drive was erratic)
Replaced the video card (monitor output went "wacky", crashing)
Replaced the main board, at the same time as the Optical drive. The video card was replaced about six months ago or so.

(about the only thing not replaced on the machine are the "chips".

The repair permissions problem did not start until 10.4.3.

On a clean install with the original Tiger disk. Its absolutely clean after repairing permissions. This only appeared after the last upgrade.

Is tech dude right or wrong.

thats a very long list of permissions that always appear in the list. Seems fishy to me.

I am having a problem with a program PALM DESKTOP. I can't sync my palm. It crashes the palm and I have to do a HARD RESET. The program will not install correctly. Or at least I get a warning it did not, but its there and it seems to function.

This worked on the clone drive (yes the clone drive has the exact same problem), I can't repair permissions on it. Howeve I can use the palm desktop, thank goodness.

any ideas/ input would be helpful.

Sorry for the long post, but this problem is either very unique or perhaps I have others out there.

What is the cause of this and how dangerous can it be.

I see lots of files having to do with the widgets (hmm, the new version of palm is supposed to interact with the desktop)

Then I see lots and lots of user files for the library etc, and what the hell is the "flight tracker box combo" and flight tracker etc. Those seem to be new when I just looked at them.

OH,

thanks for reading and helping if you can.

One other thing, I am not sure, but I think my widgets aren't working right. How do you change them and other stuff. I recall being able to reconfigure them etc and I can't change the location of the desktop weather. Or I can't find the way to do it. Is it on the desktop or do I have to dig into the drive somewhere. I recall that when they first came out it was easy to do. Did it move or am I having a brain fart. I can't find anything on the desktop to work with them when I call them up.

Hi Lonn,

I just rebuilt my computer and started with Tiger 10.4, updated to 10.4.3 and after running Repair Permissions I got a similar list to yours. I didn't write them down as after running repair I ran check and still had the same ones. Mostly Widget permissions but I don't know about any of the others lsted in your post.

I believe , mostly, the Apple Care level one personel are generally useless, but I am also baffled by the necessity to run Repair Disk Permissions after installing a new software package as well.

I have searched the Apple Support site without much luck regarding Apple statements about the necessity to run RDP again and again during any installation.

I would like someone who knows something about this to enlighten us here.

I would interpret "We are using special permissions for the file or directory ..." as a success message, not an error. I get similar ones every time I run repair permissions and never give it a thought. It's UNIX's way of taking care of things and I wouldn't presume to second guess it. If the message contained words like "unable to repair permissions on ..." or "permissions failed on ..." then I would be worried.

None of which justifies rudeness masquerading as authority from tech support.

Scott

i haven't upgraded to 10.4.3 yet.
maybe i shouldn't.

(maybe you should go back to 10.4.2?)


John,
my understanding of repairing permissions after an install is that...
during the install, all sorts of bits and pieces need to get put in various places throughout your system.
so the system has to relax it's "permissions" so the installer can do this.
afterwards, not all the permissions may be re-set back to an optimal state,
so you are advised to repair them.

as i said that's my understanding, simplistic as it is.

i cant explain why the "care" people don't care, and are rude and belligerent.

nick

Hi Lonn,

What you are seeings perfectly normal. Both of my G5 Tiger Mac show exactly the same thing.

This is how I understand it.

When a new OS is introduced like 103.0 or 10.4.0 the Repair Permission has very few lines in it. As we go through system upgrades and security upgrades, many of these changes are handled through permissions. These changes are a bit like temporary patches that show up in Permissions.

For example. When Tiger shipped it was discovered that there were security flaws in Widgets, so Apple released a security fix. This fix worked by altering permissions to block the flaw. After running the security patch, Permissions started showing all of the Widget lines that you listed above in your first post.

Just because a line shows up in the Repair Permissions window does not always mean that there is a problem and something has been fixed. Many of the lines we see in Permissions are added by Apple in OS and security updates. The older the OS, and as additional updates come down the line, more items will show up in the permissions box.

When a new OS is released, all of these security patches are built in and the Permissions window starts off relatively empty. As the new system gets updates, the permissions window will continue to grow (showing the patches).

When the next OS comes out, the permissions window should be relatively clean again until updates start com in out.

--ken

AS a former UNIX administrator in years past, I fully understand what permissions are. There are three levels of security on each and every file in the system. System - User and Other. Each of those have 3 levels of r(read) w(write) and rw(read-write). Each file has permissions at the level of each file/folder depending on the function within UNIX.

When loading a UNIX operating system, the installer has Root level security which means it can do ANYTHING! Root can delete all the files on a hard drive including the operating systems itself and since the operating system in a UNIX environment gets loaded entirely into RAM, you would not know it until you tried to restart the computer to find NO software to reload.

System permissions do not get changed when files are installed on a UNIX computer normally. The need to type in your admin password when loading most all software is not a normal admin function but sets the User as Root for that time you are installing software.

What puzzles me is how these permissions get changed! By enabling the user as Root for the time the software is installed; that mitigates the need to change permissions at all.

There is no need at all for each subsequent update of the operating system to have more problems as updates are released???

Yeah it's completely normal Lonn. Nothing to fret about.

As for your widgets, look for the small white cross at the bottom of the screen. Click this and you can add to, remove or adjust your widgets. Click it again to disable to popup menu.

Thanks for the replies. They are appreciated. What burns me up is the tech told me she had never seen this problem. Then the upstairs guy tells me its normal. All after I spent many hours trying to get this problem to go away.

So, I am back to deciding what kind of raid to buy. G raid, Lacie big disk extreme, or the burly box with sata drives.

I read that the G raid works better overall because it handles the drives filling up, or has that changed. I read what I could find on the net.

Is there a speed bump etc that is really noticable from using the sata system in place of firewire 800's.

I am going to start another thread about HD systems. I have read what others are doing and I am curious as to their success etc. I am going to bull the 16mm back out and do some shooting for high def delivery. I too found Bonolabs recently and it was the answer to getting it done since access to decks in my neck of the woods is non existent. I will be taking their system for a test drive soon and shooting 400 feet as a test.

Thanks again for the help.

One interesting thing I did find. In trying to get rid of the permissions I repaired from the original install disk. It showed them going away. As soon as I repaired from my hard drive they re-appeared. The tech said you weren't supposed to repair from the boot disk. Though I though I read you could repair from the disk.

Also a big thumps up for Carbon Copy Cloner that saved me hours of reload time.

And IDefrag which shows that these drives really do need defragings. Both are very cheap and well worth the money.

Hey Jude,

I opened that, maybe I missed it. My location for the weather is wrong. It gave me Memphis ny. Until I discovered that I thought a major storm was on the way that only they could see. LOL. I was preparing for working in weather not to be a few days ago,

because I waited a few days to write this. The first tech was cool, the person she bumped me too was not. I rewrote my disk SEVEN times. You know how long that takes. INstalled 4 times from the original. shees, I was POed.

thats again. If you can help with my quest on going Hi Def I would appreciate it. Ill keep you guys posted as to the success and/or failures in trying to shoot 16 for high def.

lb