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Apple Posts Note About Leopard Permissions Repair Warning

Apple Posts Note About Leopard Permissions Repair Warning

by , 5:10 PM EST, November 15th, 2007

Apple has published a possibly overlooked note regarding a warning some users may experience with Mac OS X Leopard, either 10.5 or 10.5.1. The message appears in Leopard's Disk Utility log window after repairing permissions.

Apple's support article # 306925 says that the following warning may appear after repairing disk permissions:

Warning: SUID file "System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/MacOS/ARDAgent has been modified and will not be repaired.

Apple advised that the message is "accurate, but not a cause for concern."

Observer Comments

Show: Subjects Only | Full Comments
Close Name:Serenak Posts: 3 Joined: 25 Apr 2007
Subject: Yes I have had this...

and suffered no ill effects...

I personally put it down to previous usage of VineServer and other non Apple VNC type stuff - whether that is the real cause is now open to question (I did a straight upgrade btw) but I have had no fallout from it - so I guess Apple are just saying like it is... True but harmless.

Close Name:Guest
Subject: Doesn't work

Disk Utility still won't repair permissions on my MacBook Pro after updating to Mac OS X 10.5.1. The progress bar remains stuck at 20%.

Close Name:Guest
Subject: SUID Warnings Multiply With OS 10.5.1

After installation (A&I) of OS 10.5, not only did Repair Permissions take 30 minutes to process, but I consistently got the Warning Notice that Apple has told us to ignore.

After installing the upgrade to 10.5.1, the Repair Permissions is reduced to 20 minutes, but I now have 10 SUID Warnings, all different file names, that "will not be repaired."

This is getting scary.

Close Name:Guest
Subject: RE: Getting Scary..

Be Brave, Little TechWarrior.

Close Name:gopher Posts: 291 Joined: 28 Mar 2002
Subject: The much bigger note is in article 306907 - backup

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=306907

Yes, Apple has finally come to terms that users must backup before any update. ANY update. It says:

"It is recommended that you backup your system prior to installing any updates."

This link appears in Software Update's description for 10.5.1, and the download from http://www.apple.com/swupdates/

You have been forewarned, and forearmed. If you don't backup, there WILL be consequences eventually. It is not a question of if but when. My FAQ explains this in more detail:

http://www.macmaps.com/backup.html

Permissions errors or not, if you don't backup, they can build if issues persist.

Close Name:Guest
Subject:

It will eventually go past 20% and finish.

Close Name:Guest
Subject: Back up

Uhhhh, what are you talking about? These warnings have nothing to do with backing up. After installing 10.5.1 and running repair permissions I got 9 of these warnings and no loss of data that I'm aware of. If these warnings are of no concern then we shouldn't be notified of them even if they are technically correct. But it would be nice to have repair permissions run in timely fashion.

Close Name:Hard Nard Posts: 2 Joined: 01 Dec 2003
Subject: Permissions

I've always used Cocktail to repair permissions and it seems to work correctly under Leopard. Could it be just a problem with Apple, or are people having the permissions problem with other repairing applications?

Close Name:Guest
Subject: sort-of fix

Download the stand alone 10.5.1 installer from Apple's website and reapply it. I don't know why, but this gets rid of all those SUID warnings except the original one about the ARD agent. It also doesn't fix the 20%-ish progress bar for 5-10 minutes issue (with an estimated time of 1 minute remaining!).

Close Name:Guest
Subject: agree

I can confirm that this is the way to "fix" the problem.
I used the smaller SWU method and saw all the "problem" messages. I then downloaded and installed the larger version, ran DU, and everything is now gone. Even the progress bar looks more like it used to.

Close Name:gopher Posts: 291 Joined: 28 Mar 2002
Subject: Permissions repair if done wrong

On a system that isn't backed up can lead to more problems than it solves, like an unbootable system. If you are backed up, then no worries. That's why I mention the backup article that came out.

Close Name:Sir Harry Flashman Posts: 792 Joined: 08 Feb 2007
Subject: Cocktail or OSX

Quote
Hard Nard wrote:
I've always used Cocktail to repair permissions and it seems to work correctly under Leopard. Could it be just a problem with Apple, or are people having the permissions problem with other repairing applications?


Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't Cocktail, and similar programs, just a front end for OSX's utilities?

Close Name:Guest
Subject: yes

Cocktail just provides a nice GUI for the UNIX utilities in OS X.

Close Name:Guest
Subject:

I have exactly the same problem - progress bar stuck at 20%. I am running an iBook G4, OS 10.5.1

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