Comments on: Changing the default Template in Mac OS X http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/ Tomos Hillman's mind-dump. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 07:31:07 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.0.5 by: yamahito http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1579 Sat, 20 Oct 2007 13:11:07 +0000 http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1579 Hi Ray, As SB says, it sounds like the permissions issues is to do with this group folder - what are the permissions of the newly created file? where's the folder located (network or local)? What was the behaviour like before you created the default template? You may find options in Workgroup Manager to change the default permissions of files created in the group folder, if WM is what is sharing it. OS X should be resetting the permissions of the files in any template to the new user's when creating the account, which is why it seems unlikely that it's related to the template itself. Otherwise the user wouldn't be able to access their own files, everything in the template being owned by root:wheel. The method above is really for templates for local accounts which authenticate to the network, rather than whole accounts stored on OS X Server. Having said that, it's an area I'm interested in myself, so I'd be interested in any information you have. I'm guessing that, where locally the machine would create new accounts as they're needed, Server forces you to create the accounts ahead of time? If so, that sounds like a bit of a pain. Hi Ray,

As SB says, it sounds like the permissions issues is to do with this group folder - what are the permissions of the newly created file? where’s the folder located (network or local)? What was the behaviour like before you created the default template? You may find options in Workgroup Manager to change the default permissions of files created in the group folder, if WM is what is sharing it.

OS X should be resetting the permissions of the files in any template to the new user’s when creating the account, which is why it seems unlikely that it’s related to the template itself. Otherwise the user wouldn’t be able to access their own files, everything in the template being owned by root:wheel.

The method above is really for templates for local accounts which authenticate to the network, rather than whole accounts stored on OS X Server. Having said that, it’s an area I’m interested in myself, so I’d be interested in any information you have. I’m guessing that, where locally the machine would create new accounts as they’re needed, Server forces you to create the accounts ahead of time? If so, that sounds like a bit of a pain.

]]> by: SilentBob http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1578 Sat, 20 Oct 2007 12:47:51 +0000 http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1578 I haven't played around with user templates in OSX, but it sounds like you've got a permissions problem (that's unrelated to the template). You should be able to tell the permissions using the ls command (e.g. ls -l), which should tell you the owner and group associated with the file/folder. If you need to modify the permissions, privileged users can use chown, unprivileged users can use chgrp (if they're the owner of the file). If the file is already assigned to the correct group but other members can't access it, you (or the owner) may have to use chmod to change the permissions so that members of the group have access (whether you want to give them read or read-write access is up to you/the user). If you want subsequent files in the group folder to be given the group permission when files are placed in there, you may want to investigate using the setgid bit. If the setgid bit on a directory entry is set, files in that directory will have the group ownership as the directory, instead of than the group of the user that created the file. The setgid bit can be set using the chmod command. If you're not feeling too confident, it's probably worth reading the man pages for chmod, chown, chgrp, and reading up on file system permissions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_system_permissions I haven’t played around with user templates in OSX, but it sounds like you’ve got a permissions problem (that’s unrelated to the template). You should be able to tell the permissions using the ls command (e.g. ls -l), which should tell you the owner and group associated with the file/folder. If you need to modify the permissions, privileged users can use chown, unprivileged users can use chgrp (if they’re the owner of the file). If the file is already assigned to the correct group but other members can’t access it, you (or the owner) may have to use chmod to change the permissions so that members of the group have access (whether you want to give them read or read-write access is up to you/the user). If you want subsequent files in the group folder to be given the group permission when files are placed in there, you may want to investigate using the setgid bit. If the setgid bit on a directory entry is set, files in that directory will have the group ownership as the directory, instead of than the group of the user that created the file. The setgid bit can be set using the chmod command. If you’re not feeling too confident, it’s probably worth reading the man pages for chmod, chown, chgrp, and reading up on file system permissions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_system_permissions

]]> by: Ray http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1577 Sat, 20 Oct 2007 12:07:14 +0000 http://yamahito.net/blog/2007/10/11/changing-the-default-template-in-mac-os-x/#comment-1577 Hi, i used this on an osx server for work group manager to create customized user home folders. What im finding now is that when one user creates a file/folder and places it into a group folder, other members of the group can't open it. Just to clarify, it is a permissions issue? if so, after over 200-300 users already created, is there a way to change the permissions with too much pain! Hi, i used this on an osx server for work group manager to create customized user home folders. What im finding now is that when one user creates a file/folder and places it into a group folder, other members of the group can’t open it. Just to clarify, it is a permissions issue? if so, after over 200-300 users already created, is there a way to change the permissions with too much pain!

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