[Matt OS X]

I was tryiing to 'drag and drop' an iPhone format movie clip made in mp4. And I get this message:



I checked the iTunes "Get info" and all files are "Read & Write" under my account.

Next, I ran "Disk Utility" disk permission.

Nothing seems to work? I tried on another user account and it worked over there. But not mine? Even though I checked and compared the "Read & Write".. What's going on?? Help. Thanks.

[Cold Warrior]

Files may say read/write, but what about the folder you're trying to copy to?

[Matt OS X]

Yeah, I checked iTunes' folder and all said "Read/Write". Am I missing something here?

[Cold Warrior]

First, I'd boot from the the Leopard DVD or your Mac's restore/install disc and run Disk Utility to make sure the drive isn't borked.

Second, chmod may work to fix/set permissions system-wide if Repair Permissions won't do anything...something along the lines of instructions in this thread, but I'm not an expert at it.

Chuckit, ibook steve, CharlesS, et al. - any feedback, ideas on chmod for Matt's problem?

[CharlesS]

This oughta change every directory in the Music folder to be writable by you:

find ~/Music -type d -exec chmod 755 {} \;

This one is simpler and easier to enter, but will change all the files as well as the folders (thus setting the executable bit on a bunch of regular files that don't need it).

chmod -R 755 ~/Music

In case you don't own the files inside your own Music folder by some bizarre circumstance, you can just change the owner like this:

chown -R <username> ~/Music

Replace <username> with whatever your short username is.

[Matt OS X]

Originally Posted by CharlesS 

find ~/Music -type d -exec chmod 755 {} \;

chmod -R 755 ~/Music

Whoa.. I'm no expert with command by using Terminal application. Uhmm, is there a way that you guys can make this easier for me to resolve this issue? If doing the command is the only way, I'm more than willing to give it a shot but will it screw up my system if I dont follow it correctly? Can you please give me step by step instructions by using these command above.

[CharlesS]

The second command would set the executable bit on a bunch of regular files, which wouldn't damage anything but which isn't standard practice (regular files are usually set to 644 or something similar), although it has the advantage of being easier to enter. The first command is better, and works like this:

find ~/Music performs a search inside the folder ~/Music. ~ means your home directory, so this means we are searching inside the Music folder immediately inside your home folder.

-type d means to match files that are directories, i.e. the find command will find all folders inside your Music folder.

-exec means we are going to execute a shell tool.

chmod 755 {} \; is the actual shell command we are executing - chmod is a tool that changes permissions on a file, 755 is the permissions mode we are going to apply (readable, writable, and searchable by the owner, readable and searchable by others). {} gets replaced by each path found by the find command, and \; just means to end the shell command.

It shouldn't mess anything up as long as you enter the ~/Music path correctly, and don't put something else in there.

If you don't want to use the Terminal, you could try changing the permissions in Get Info on the Music folder to Read/Write and then choose "Apply to enclosed items". I'm not sure exactly how that option functions, though, since I generally don't use it.

[Cold Warrior]

edit: Charles replied first. See his post.

[Matt OS X]

Whoo.. I ran chmod -R 755 ~/Music and it worked beautifully!!!!!!!!! THANKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Art Vandelay]

Or simply propagating the permissions in the Get Info window would work too.