Sharing home folder om OS X?
Loren Finkelstein
I'd like my wife and I to have read write access to each others home
folders on our OS X machine without logging out & back in using the
other's password.
I know this can be done unixwise, although I am not sure of the best way
to do it. But can it be done in an Apple kind of way? I
Control-Clicked on my home folder hoping to see a "sharing" option where
I could add a user and give them rights. No luck.
Other options?
Thanks,
Loren
Andrew J. Brehm
If you are the only two people using that computer, you could give
read/wrote access to the group.
Click in your home folder, press Apple-i, choose "Priveleges" and change
the "Group" entry from "Read only" to "Read&Write".
--
Fan of Woody Allen
PowerPC User
Supporter of Pepperoni Pizza
Wes Groleau
> folders on our OS X machine without logging out & back in using the
> other's password.
Select your home directory in Finder.
Pop up the info window.
change the menu to "Privileges"
Change the group settings and let them propagate
all the way down. (See the little thing on the widget about applying to
contents).
--
Wes Groleau
http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~wgroleau
Ross Anderson
"Loren Finkelstein" <Lo...@Finkelstein.Net> wrote:
Have you tried using the "Shared" folder in the Users directory?
I know it's not quite the same, but it's a nice easy way of sharing common
files :)
--
Ross
Ron Goodman
nice Mac-like way to look at and alter permissions. They're handy for
other things too, like emptying the Trash when it doesn't want to let
you.
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Daniel E. Sabath
<ross.a...@risingpad.com> wrote:
> On 25/1/02 10:16 pm, in article Loren-3EDD0D....@news1.panix.com,
> "Loren Finkelstein" <Lo...@Finkelstein.Net> wrote:
>
> > This is probably more of a Unix question than a Mac question, but...
> >
> > I'd like my wife and I to have read write access to each others home
> > folders on our OS X machine without logging out & back in using the
> > other's password.
> >
> > I know this can be done unixwise, although I am not sure of the best way
> > to do it. But can it be done in an Apple kind of way? I
> > Control-Clicked on my home folder hoping to see a "sharing" option where
> > I could add a user and give them rights. No luck.
> >
> > Other options?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Loren
>
> Have you tried using the "Shared" folder in the Users directory?
I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
wife could access but not our son?
Dan
--
Daniel E. Sabath, M.D., Ph.D.
University of Washington Department of Laboratory Medicine
http://www.labmed.washington.edu
Ross Anderson
dsabath-2501...@private-client-ip-177.oz.net, "Daniel E. Sabath"
<dsa...@u.washington.edu> wrote:
> In article <B877AA8D.1235%ross.a...@risingpad.com>, Ross Anderson
> <ross.a...@risingpad.com> wrote:
>
>> On 25/1/02 10:16 pm, in article Loren-3EDD0D....@news1.panix.com,
>> "Loren Finkelstein" <Lo...@Finkelstein.Net> wrote:
>>
>>> This is probably more of a Unix question than a Mac question, but...
>>>
>>> I'd like my wife and I to have read write access to each others home
>>> folders on our OS X machine without logging out & back in using the
>>> other's password.
>>>
>>> I know this can be done unixwise, although I am not sure of the best way
>>> to do it. But can it be done in an Apple kind of way? I
>>> Control-Clicked on my home folder hoping to see a "sharing" option where
>>> I could add a user and give them rights. No luck.
>>>
>>> Other options?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>> Loren
>>
>> Have you tried using the "Shared" folder in the Users directory?
>
> I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> wife could access but not our son?
>
> Dan
Ahh, in that case you would need to create a folder on the drive and
manually assign the permissions so that only you and your wife have
read/write access. I believe the way to do this has been covered by some
other replies to your post.
Happy computing :)
--
Ross
Davoud
> I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> wife could access but not our son?
******
Now we're playing "Whom do you trust". You and your wife could share
the same account. This is what you used to do if you have been a Mac
user for any length of time.
I wouldn't begin to tell you what to do about your son, even if I knew
how old he is. I would tell you that I am quite old fashioned, and
would never allow a child of mine to have his or her own account on an
Internet-connected computer, or have any access whatsoever to such a
computer, without a parent present in the same room, able to glance at
the monitor to see what was happening.
Davoud
Clayburn W. Juniel, III
dsa...@u.washington.edu (Daniel E. Sabath) wrote:
> I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> wife could access but not our son?
It seems with OS X there is no easy way to control groups. Any folder
created by any user is put in the "staff" group. Any user is also a
member of the "staff" group. I did find a way to accomplish what you
want. I don't know if it is the best way. If it isn't maybe some Unix
guru could tell me the best way to do this.
Launch NetInfo Manager (Applications/Utilities/NetInfo Mangaer)
Click on the lock icon at the bottom of the window
Enter your password (Administrative password)
Click OK
Click on groups
In the menu choose Directory/New Directory
In the directory window double click on new_directory and change the name
to Child or anything else you want.
in the menu choose Directory/New Property.
Change "new_property" to "gid".
Change "new_value" to "123"
In the menu choose Domain/Save
Choose update this copy
You have just created a new group named "Child" with an id number of 123.
Click on users in the Directory Browser
In the next window to the right click on the user name that you want to
restrict access to.
In the Directory below locate the property gid and change the its value to
123. (I believe its old value should be 20).
In the menu choose Domain/Save
Choose update this copy
You have just changed the group of the person you want to restrict from
"staff" to "Child". You can now create a folder in your home folder and
change the privileges of everyone to none and the privileges of group to
Read / Write.
The proper way to do this should have been to create a group for both you
and your wife. Create a folder and assign it to that group. Then
restrict access to just members of that group. But I couldn't find a way
to create a folder and assign it to a group. Again maybe some Unix guru
will come along and answer that.
--
Clay
Warning! Opinions will change due to new information.
http://EffectiveSoftwareSolutions.com
Arthur Ogus
<rgoo...@taconic.net> wrote:
This isn't enough. You need to get the system to actually make the
directories available. I recommend the neat freeware application
Sharepoints, available from versiontracker.
ZnU
cl...@cox.net (Clayburn W. Juniel, III) wrote:
> In article <dsabath-2501...@private-client-ip-177.oz.net>,
> dsa...@u.washington.edu (Daniel E. Sabath) wrote:
>
> > I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> > people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> > wife could access but not our son?
>
> It seems with OS X there is no easy way to control groups. Any folder
> created by any user is put in the "staff" group. Any user is also a
> member of the "staff" group.
OS X Server comes with nice tools for groups. A ton of the stuff in OS X
Server would be really useful for people with home networks. IMO, Apple
should make a lot of the OS X Server stuff (especially the NetInfo
configuration stuff) free for non-commercial use.
[snip]
--
"We are living in a world today where lemonade is made from artificial
flavors,and furniture polish is made from real lemons."
--Alfred E. Newman
Steve Hix
> > Have you tried using the "Shared" folder in the Users directory?
>
> I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> wife could access but not our son?
Make sure that he doesn't have an admin account, that you and your wife
do, and set permissions for the shared folder to block non-admin access.
Lessee...
If you're root:
# cd /Users
# ls -l
drwxrwxrwt 27 root wheel 874 Jan 20 15:29 Shared
[ignoring all the user accounts...]
# chmod 770 ./Shared
# ls -l
drwxrwx--- 27 root wheel 874 Jan 20 15:29 Shared
[again, ignoring all the user accounts...]
Ought to do the job, until he learns how to get admin status.
Terrence R. Redding, Ph.D.
BTW I am now learning OS X primarily to run the Apache web server junction.
Just the thought of the instructions below make me proud to also be running
MacHttp server.
Terry
in article sehix-42A591....@news.dsldesigns.com, Steve Hix at
se...@mac.com wrote on 1/26/02 5:30 PM:
Steve Hix
> in article sehix-42A591....@news.dsldesigns.com, Steve Hix at
> se...@mac.com wrote on 1/26/02 5:30 PM:
>
> > Make sure that he doesn't have an admin account, that you and your wife
> > do, and set permissions for the shared folder to block non-admin access.
> >
> > Lessee...
> >
> > If you're root:
> >
> > # cd /Users
> > # ls -l
> > drwxrwxrwt 27 root wheel 874 Jan 20 15:29 Shared
> > [ignoring all the user accounts...]
> >
> > # chmod 770 ./Shared
> > # ls -l
> > drwxrwx--- 27 root wheel 874 Jan 20 15:29 Shared
> > [again, ignoring all the user accounts...]
> >
> > Ought to do the job, until he learns how to get admin status.
>
That *is* the easy solution. Seriously:
- go to the /Users directory (where Shared and all the users' directories live).
- verify that Shared is there. (Not *necessary*, but I'm a belt and suspenders
sort of person.)
- Change permissions of Shared so that non-administrators (the son) can't read/write
to the directory.
- Verify that the change was made.
> BTW I am now learning OS X primarily to run the Apache web server junction.
> Just the thought of the instructions below make me proud to also be running
> MacHttp server.
Well, all right...
If you're logged on as root (since it owns /Shared):
- Double click on the boot volume. (The drive icon at the upper
right corner of the screen.) If you don't have icons showing on
the desktop, type command-n to bring up a finder window and then
select the boot volume, just in case you have more than one volume
on the system.)
Assuming that you're looking at things in icon view:
- Double-click "Users"
- Click on "Shared" to select it.
- Press command-I
- Click on the "Shared Info" window.
- Click on the "Information" button.
- Select "Privileges" from the drop-down menu.
- Click on the "Everyone" button.
- Select "None" from the drop-down menu (or "Write-only", if you
want the son to be able to hand in assignments).
- Click on the red button to close the information window.
- Click on the red button to close finder window...
Is that what you wanted?
Clayburn W. Juniel, III
dsa...@u.washington.edu (Daniel E. Sabath) wrote:
> I was wondering the same thing. The Shared folder would work if only two
> people were using the computer. How about a shared folder that me and my
> wife could access but not our son?
I figured out how to do this a better way. I checked out Super Get Info,
and it lets you change what group a file or folder belongs to.
In short you need to use NetInfo Manager to create a new group (parents).
Give that group a "gid" different from any other existing group. And
assign it users you and your wife. Create a folder in your home folder
and name it Parents (doesn't have to be the same name as the group). you
can then use Super Get Info to change the name of the group for Parents to
"parents". Alternatively you can go into the terminal and type chgrp
parents Parents, and that will change the group to "parents". Then change
access privileges to group only. This way your wife doesn't even need to
be an admin for the system.
If you need more detailed explanations let me know.
Simon Slavin
Loren Finkelstein <Lo...@Finkelstein.Net> wrote:
> I'd like my wife and I to have read write access to each others home
> folders on our OS X machine without logging out & back in using the
> other's password.
With the setup you descibe above, why bother setting up two
accounts ? You'd be better-off just using one account and
having separate folders for your personal files.
Home directories are usually considered to be private. However,
Mac OS X provides an area specifically allocated to the files a
person wants to share with the other users of the computer: the
'Shared' folder in your home directory. This is shared by
default. You can put anything you like in there: WP documents,
movies, sound files, etc..
If you want to share files with your wife, put them in
/Users/Shared . If either of you wants to maintain ownership of
your files but allow the other person to see them put them in
your own /Users/<username>/Shared directory.
Simon.
--
http://www.hearsay.demon.co.uk | [One] thing that worries me about Bush and
No junk email please. | Blair's "war on terrorism" is: how will they
| know when they've won it ? -- Terry Jones
THE FRENCH WAS THERE
Wes Groleau
> Have you tried using the "Shared" folder in the Users directory?
>
> I know it's not quite the same, but it's a nice easy way of sharing common
> files :)
Or the Public folder for each person?
Wes Groleau
> In short you need to use NetInfo Manager to create a new group (parents).
CAUTION: I created a group "parents" and another "children"
And just to be semantically accurate* I renamed "staff" to
"family" Things I didn't want the kids messing with I made
group "parents" and the rest stayed "family" "children" is
not yet used for anything they share, but obviously it's
their primary group.
Anyway, I keep having little odd & irritating glitches that
I think may be related to this.
Wes Groleau
> Anyway, I keep having little odd & irritating glitches that
> I think may be related to this.
Little too quick on the Send.
I would recommend leaving everything "staff"
and removing "group" privileges on stuff that's
not for the children to tamper with.
Clayburn W. Juniel, III
> > In short you need to use NetInfo Manager to create a new group (parents).
>
> CAUTION: I created a group "parents" and another "children"
> And just to be semantically accurate* I renamed "staff" to
> "family" Things I didn't want the kids messing with I made
> group "parents" and the rest stayed "family" "children" is
> not yet used for anything they share, but obviously it's
> their primary group.
>
> Anyway, I keep having little odd & irritating glitches that
> I think may be related to this.
I wouldn't have renamed "staff" to "Family". Does your system now create
files created by users "Family", or is it still "Staff"? I have to check
this out.
Wes Groleau
> I wouldn't have renamed "staff" to "Family". Does your system now create
> files created by users "Family", or is it still "Staff"? I have to check
> this out.
Depends on what you do. Files are created with
the primary group of the user, unless the tool
has GID set. However, downloaded items come as
either 'staff' or 'unknown'
One of my difficulties is that the admin lock
on some programs does absolutely nothing.
One such is the iPhoto installer. Click on
it, nothing happens. Copy the installer, change
it's group or owner, or become root, and try to
run it--permission denied!
Other items, when I click the lock, fire up a PPP
dialup connection, even though I KNOW they don't
need it.
Sounds almost like a virus, but I've downloaded very
few things, and I run Norton AV regularly, and I
have the firewall pretty well locked up tight.
??? Any fix ideas? (I really am considering
backing up up user dirs and reinstalling OS X.)
Simon Slavin
Wes Groleau <wesgr...@despammed.com> wrote:
> I renamed "staff" to
> "family"
Rename it back. You can create your own 'family' if you want.
ZnU
sla...@hearsay.demon.co.uk@localhost (Simon Slavin) wrote:
> In article <3C557DD...@despammed.com>,
> Wes Groleau <wesgr...@despammed.com> wrote:
>
> > I renamed "staff" to
> > "family"
>
> Rename it back. You can create your own 'family' if you want.
Should it really matter? Does the OS pay attention to anything except
GIDs?
Wes Groleau
> > > I renamed "staff" to
> > > "family"
> >
> > Rename it back. You can create your own 'family' if you want.
>
> Should it really matter? Does the OS pay attention to anything except
> GIDs?
Well, I was just saying that I didn't think long enough
before doing it. When you install new stuff, it's (sometimes)
pre-packaged as "staff" (actually "20") so either install
or use or both can be a little "off"
If I had just changed the NAME of the group to 'family'
and left the number alone, it would probably have been
completely transparent.
Simon Slavin
ZnU <z...@znu.dhs.org> wrote:
> sla...@hearsay.demon.co.uk@localhost (Simon Slavin) wrote:
>
> > Wes Groleau <wesgr...@despammed.com> wrote:
> >
> > > I renamed "staff" to
> > > "family"
> >
> > Rename it back. You can create your own 'family' if you want.
>
> Should it really matter? Does the OS pay attention to anything except
> GIDs?
The OS calls don't, but a large number of scripts will refer
to the 'staff' group by name. It's a standard name which has
been around a long time and people are used to it.