[dgritzer]

For some reason software update has ceased to work. It is able to connect and find the latest updates, prompts me for and accepts my password, begins the download, but then pops up with the following error message:

None of the checked updates could be installed: Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/501/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again.

I repair permissions regularly, and can't figure out what went wrong. Please help if anyone has an idea. I am running 10.3.3 on a g4 powerbook.

Thanks

[jbob]

crashes software update for me every time I try to update QT 6.4 to 6.5

goes ass-up shortly after asking for password

others update fine!

PBG4 1G1G 10,3,3

[gorickey]

Originally posted by dgritzer:
For some reason software update has ceased to work. It is able to connect and find the latest updates, prompts me for and accepts my password, begins the download, but then pops up with the following error message:

None of the checked updates could be installed: Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/501/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again.

I repair permissions regularly, and can't figure out what went wrong. Please help if anyone has an idea. I am running 10.3.3 on a g4 powerbook.

Thanks

Does this happen to be the "4/5/04 Security Update" it fails on? If so, it's not just you...

*UPDATE*

A simple restart and using Software Update again seemed to work this time. Give that a shot.

[dgritzer]

The 4/5/04 security update is one of the updates, but even after restarting the same thing happens. I've even deselected the security update and attempted to install one of the others by themselves (ichat update, bluetooth update, etc.), and each one gives me the same error. Any other ideas?

[utidjian]

Originally posted by dgritzer:
The 4/5/04 security update is one of the updates, but even after restarting the same thing happens. I've even deselected the security update and attempted to install one of the others by themselves (ichat update, bluetooth update, etc.), and each one gives me the same error. Any other ideas?

You might try in Terminal.app:

sudo softwareupdate -a -i

and see if it tells you a bit more about what exactly is failing.

[dgritzer]

the terminal app listed the following error for each of the updates being installed:

AirPort Software: 0...10...20...30...40...2004-04-27 13:01:53.698 softwareupdate[405] can't create temp directory
Failed
Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again.


Anyone know what that means? Or how to fix it?

[wadesworld]

Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again.


Anyone know what that means? Or how to fix it?

It means "Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again."

Paste the output of this command here:

ls -al /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/

Wade

[utidjian]

Originally posted by dgritzer:
the terminal app listed the following error for each of the updates being installed:

AirPort Software: 0...10...20...30...40...2004-04-27 13:01:53.698 softwareupdate[405] can't create temp directory
Failed
Make sure you have permission to write to /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again.


Anyone know what that means? Or how to fix it?

Yes... (just tested it here).

softwareupdate (either commandline or app) creates a temporary folder in /private/tmp named /private/tmp/0/. I don't know why you can't write to it when you do sudo... essentially the softwareupdate program runs as root then and should be able to do what it damn well pleases.

If you have a /private/tmp/0 folder at all, just remove it:

cd /private/tmp/
sudo rm -Rf 0/

Note: be very careful with that command... DO NOT put a space between the "0" and the "/". If you do you will hose your entire system.

Then you should be able to run softwareupdate without complaint. If you still get the same complaint you need to tell us what ls -l tells you about who owns those folders and what the permissions are.

Just thought of something else... is the volume that /private/tmp is on full?

[dgritzer]

the output of the ls command is:

ls: /private/tmp/0/TemporaryItems/: Permission denied

about to try the rest of the suggestions and will report back.

[dgritzer]

i tried running the remove 0/ command from the /private/tmp directory...it prompted me for my password and then put me back at the prompt. I tried running software update again, both sudo and the normal way, but got the same permission denied for the private/tmp/0 folder error. I'm assuming these folders are on my hard drive (where else would they be?...i only use one HD), which has over 30GB of free space.

I'm not very good at tinkering with the internals of my mac, so any more ideas are appreciated.

[utidjian]

Originally posted by dgritzer:
i tried running the remove 0/ command from the /private/tmp directory...it prompted me for my password and then put me back at the prompt. I tried running software update again, both sudo and the normal way, but got the same permission denied for the private/tmp/0 folder error. I'm assuming these folders are on my hard drive (where else would they be?...i only use one HD), which has over 30GB of free space.

I'm not very good at tinkering with the internals of my mac, so any more ideas are appreciated.

If the "rm -Rf 0/" command was successful it would not report anything back to you... that means it was successful. If the command was unsuccessful it would complain in some way.

If you only have one disk and the usual "Macintosh HD" volume on it then that should not be a problem.

I have no idea what might be the problem... Mac OS X seems to be somewhat plagued with these permissions issues. Many people have no problems at all... and some have them all the time. Even with the "Repair Permissions" utility there seem to be problems.

I checked some of the forums at Apple and the best thing I can see to try next is to delete the prefs file for SoftwareUpdate.

Log in as the usual user that has admin privs then open a a terminal. Type:

rm Library/Preferences/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate.plist
cd /private/tmp
sudo rm -Rf 0/
cd
sudo softwareupdate -a -i

See if that works.

Only other thing I can think of is to enable the root user account, log in as root, and run softwareupdate as the root user directly. That is quite a drastic measure however and really should not be required at all. To enable the root user account... even temporarily... partially breaks the security model of Mac OS X. You can disable it after you make do the update.

[PHYMAC]

None of the updates in my software update are showing up!

I read that there is an ipod one, quicktime, and iTunes, and none of them showed up. The Second airport one I downloaded last night, but nothing else is popping up.... Anyone know why???

[dylanw]

Originally posted by PHYMAC:
None of the updates in my software update are showing up!

I read that there is an ipod one, quicktime, and iTunes, and none of them showed up. The Second airport one I downloaded last night, but nothing else is popping up.... Anyone know why???

I get the same problem, but when I tried downloading the .dmg files fro Apple, I had several instances of "posix error: connection reset by peer" and then when I finally did download it, none of the images would mount. Argh.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by PHYMAC:
Anyone know why???

Yep.

Apple has posted them to SU yet...nothing is wrong...

[dgritzer]

i tried deleting the software update preferences, but the error continues. I haven't logged in through root yet, since I'd rather fix the problem for good than work around it, but if it comes to that I will. Thanks everyone for the input--certainly many things I wouldn't have known to try. Any more ideas are welcome...

[nsxpower]

Same problem on PowerBook G4 (Ti) 1Ghz SD 10.3.3:

- Permissions denied in Software update. Repair permissions, restart etc. don't fix anything.
- Downloading dmg from Apple fails too, "no mountable volumes".

Very frustrating.

[brutal]

This also happended to me after I had done an uninstall of the apple developer tools. It seems that there is a huge bug in the uninstall-script that deletes some essential system-files as well.

If you've recently uninstalled your developer tools and this problem occurs, the only solution I've heard for this problem is to reinstall them again.. (or maybe rebuild the system with pacifier)

[nsxpower]

Yes, I unistalled Xcode a short while ago. Reinstalling Xcode fixes the problem? I am not entirely familiar with how I can restore my system with Pacifist(er) since I am not sure which files were removed by Xcode uninstall script ... that said there is NO WAY I am doing a reinstall for a QuickTime update.

[chabig]

I would think that a simple privilege repair would fix the problem.

Chris

[nsxpower]

I tried repairing permissions already, does not help.

[bergy]

See if any of this applies ...

Apple - Troubleshooting Software Update
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106695

TroubleShooting Software Update 2
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106692

Safari and Software Update
http://www.macworld.com/forums/ubbth...rue#Post201718