[marcmongo]

First of all, it's a friends 400mhz Imac with 256 megs of RAM, running OSX 10.3.2, and 9.2.2. The problems, sadly, ARE:

Classic will not start. Message reads, "Classic cannot start. There is a problems saving preferences required to run Classic."

QuickTime in OSX will not run. "In order to function properly, QuickTime needs to know your Connection Speed to the internet. This information is set in System Preferences." Opening System Preferences, and changing the Connection Speed does nothing. Closing System Preferences, and opening QuickTime settings, the Connection Speed is back at 56kbps modem/ISDN, as it was before. (The connection is a fast DSL.)

RealOne Player, iTunes, et al, when opened, behave as they are being opened for the first time after being installed, each time after restart requesting initial data ie prefs.

System Preferences > Software Update cannot run. The error message reads:
"Make sure you have permission to write to /tmp/502/TemporaryItems/com.apple.SoftwareUpdate, then try again." I can't find this.

Switching to OS 9 as start-up disk, the terminal comes up instead, with the message:
"bootstrap_look_up()failed (ipc/send) invalid destination port d64-180-46-139:/root #"
I then have to kill everything with a hard boot/ holding cntrl-opt-comm-esc, and it re-starts into OS 9. OS 9 is running fine, QuickTime and all.

HELP EHLP PLHE HELP
marcmongo@myway.com

[f1000]

Try repairing the iMac’s HD by running Disk Utility from the boot disk.

[awaspaas]

Repair permissions!!!!!!

/Applications/Utilities/Disk Utility

Oh, and doesn't this sound like the /tmp/ symbolic link needs to be recreated? I remember that problem kept Classic and SW Update from running.

[absmiths]

Originally posted by awaspaas:
Repair permissions!!!!!!

That was my first thought as well. Although, I would run:

Code:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /

From the prompt instead. It seems safer than running a GUI app if your system really is that hosed.

/tmp should be a symbolic link to /private/tmp, by the way. This command will create it for you if it isn't there:

Code:
sudo ln -s /private/tmp /tmp

It should be owned by root and the permissions shold be 755, but I think that will happen anyway. Maybe you should run this:

Code:
sudo chown root:admin /tmp
sudo chmod 755 /tmp

This matches what is on my system - but you might want to wait to see if it is necessary or get confirmation from other users before running it.

[marcmongo]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by absmiths:
[B]That was my first thought as well. Although, I would run:

Code:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /

From the prompt instead. It seems safer than running a GUI app if your system really is that hosed.

I did this Hereès what I got:
Carbon Lazy Value Total size: 11057 bytes!

/tmp should be a symbolic link to /private/tmp, by the way. This command will create it for you if it isn't there:

Code:
sudo ln -s /private/tmp /tmp

Running this I got:
ln: illegal option -- /
usage: ln [-fhinsv] file1 file2
ln [-fhinsv] ... directory
link file1 file2

It should be owned by root and the permissions shold be 755, but I think that will happen anyway. Maybe you should run this:

Code:
sudo chown root:admin /tmp
sudo chmod 755 /tmp

And running this it said something about 755 being "read only".

Umm, argghh?

[malvolio]

Sounds to me like your friend's hard drive is too full, preventing prefs files from getting written to it. He should have at least 15% free space on his hard drive to avoid problems like this.

[awaspaas]

Originally posted by marcmongo:
Running this I got:
ln: illegal option -- /
usage: ln [-fhinsv] file1 file2
ln [-fhinsv] ... directory
link file1 file2

Yikes, watch your spaces dude - whatever you do, never type any rm command at the prompt!!

[marcmongo]

Originally posted by malvolio:
Sounds to me like your friend's hard drive is too full, preventing prefs files from getting written to it. He should have at least 15% free space on his hard drive to avoid problems like this.

Nope. The hardrive has 7 gigs free.

[marcmongo]

Originally posted by awaspaas:
Yikes, watch your spaces dude - whatever you do, never type any rm command at the prompt!!

OK. I found that running code:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions
in single-user mode cause it to hang,
replied by pushing cntrl-c and it frees it.

Another thing typing "reboot" in terminal does nothing.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by marcmongo:
OK. I found that running code:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions
in single-user mode cause it to hang,
replied by pushing cntrl-c and it frees it.

Another thing typing "reboot" in terminal does nothing.

You can't run diskutil from single-user mode.

Why not just repair permissions using Disk Utility? If things are really hosed, you can boot from the install CD and do it. Messing around with the command line is clearly making things unnecessarily difficult here.

Yeah, you can get diskutil to work from single-user mode if you know how to do it, but you have to load a bunch of kernel extensions, start the mach bootstrap server, start the security server... just boot from the CD and use DU, that's my recommendation.

[marcmongo]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
You can't run diskutil from single-user mode.

Why not just repair permissions using Disk Utility? If things are really hosed, you can boot from the install CD and do it. Messing around with the command line is clearly making things unnecessarily difficult here.

Yeah, you can get diskutil to work from single-user mode if you know how to do it, but you have to load a bunch of kernel extensions, start the mach bootstrap server, start the security server... just boot from the CD and use DU, that's my recommendation.

I booted from install CD, ran disk utility, no problems.

I have ran fsck -y
It won't let me reboot afterwards (or anytime for that matter), "root" prompt keeps coming back up, there is plenty of harddrive space, so...?

Also, when I download the mac osx 10.3.4 update, it won't allow me to install, says cannot be performed on drive selected or some such.

Besides completely reinstalling the 10.3 system, are there options? I'm willing to learn. I just want to know what it is before I wipe it all away.

"Is that so wrong?"

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by marcmongo:
I booted from install CD, ran disk utility, no problems.

I have ran fsck -y
It won't let me reboot afterwards (or anytime for that matter), "root" prompt keeps coming back up, there is plenty of harddrive space, so...?

Did you repair permissions with Disk Utility, or only do the disk verify/repair?

Also, when I download the mac osx 10.3.4 update, it won't allow me to install, says cannot be performed on drive selected or some such.

If you can get to a GUI somehow, you can use my app, Pacifist, to force the 10.3.4 update to install (I recommend using the combo update for this rather than the regular update).

[absmiths]

Originally posted by marcmongo:

And running this it said something about 755 being "read only".

Umm, argghh? [/B]

Yeah, nevermind my post. That's the easy way for me - less hassle. I generally take care of stuff like this remotely or in Terminal. If The installer doesn't recognize that OS 10.3 is installed on the drive then you have bigger problems than permissions. I would re-install 10.3 (Archive and install) then try to apply 10.3.4 and see where you are. Forcing an incremental update on a hosed system has a better chance of hosing it up more than of fixing it.

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by absmiths:
Forcing an incremental update on a hosed system has a better chance of hosing it up more than of fixing it.

Not really, if some file got hosed while the software update was running, then forcing the update to install again would overwrite the corrupted files with clean ones from the package. And if the system's already dead anyway, you don't have much to lose - you can always do an archive and install later if it doesn't work.

[marcmongo]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Not really, if some file got hosed while the software update was running, then forcing the update to install again would overwrite the corrupted files with clean ones from the package. And if the system's already dead anyway, you don't have much to lose - you can always do an archive and install later if it doesn't work.

Fellas, thanks. Here's what I did:

But first, I am the music editor at Cannabis Culture magazine, and I have to recommend so terrifi music I heard this morning: http://www.donovanf.com. Check out only if you prefer Jack Johnson and Ben Harper.

Back to the solution. First of all, I DID download Pacifist. And after researching it, I imagine it to be an indispensible tool. I was EVEN set to pay for using it, after it worked. However, here's what went wrong in my case. I applied it to the 10.3 and 10.4 updates I got from the Apple website, and in both cases I got a error message of (I believe) -60008.

That done, I started over from scratch, and re-installed 10.3, updated to 10.4, and everything works like a charm. I AM glad to know about Pacifist, however, and I appreciate the personal touch, Charles. i am sure you found at least one new customer here.

Peace, and, again, thanks.

[absmiths]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Not really, if some file got hosed while the software update was running, then forcing the update to install again would overwrite the corrupted files with clean ones from the package.

That seems a bit optimistic. If you are only having problem with a file which will be rewritten by an installer, then your chances are very good. However, usually problems like this relate to configuration errors or corruption of system data structures - most of which will be untouched by reinstalling an intermediate update.

Your experience may differ, but rerunning installers on Mac or Windows has rarely recovered a working application (or system) for me.

[marcmongo]

Originally posted by absmiths:
That seems a bit optimistic. If you are only having problem with a file which will be rewritten by an installer, then your chances are very good. However, usually problems like this relate to configuration errors or corruption of system data structures - most of which will be untouched by reinstalling an intermediate update.

Your experience may differ, but rerunning installers on Mac or Windows has rarely recovered a working application (or system) for me.

Hmmm. I checked out everything that was operating abnormally before and ALL the problems have been cleared up, every one:
All the prefs save.
Quickktime is running.
Classic is opening.
None of the files deny me access.
There is no beak between restarts.
Etc etc etc.

One closing note of interest: The tmp/502 files have completely which were unapparent in the Previous System are all in place and functioning properly ie without permission changes or losing preference identities upon restart.

"The point of living and of being an optimist, is to be foolish enough to believe the best is yet to come." – Peter Ustinov (1921 - 2004)

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by marcmongo:
Back to the solution. First of all, I DID download Pacifist. And after researching it, I imagine it to be an indispensible tool. I was EVEN set to pay for using it, after it worked. However, here's what went wrong in my case. I applied it to the 10.3 and 10.4 updates I got from the Apple website, and in both cases I got a error message of (I believe) -60008.

Ugh, errAuthorizationInternal. What system were you booted from when you got this?