Yikes...!

Bizarre stuff.

So, this morning, I restarted my computer for the first time since installing the 2008-005 Security Update (which I did last night, along with the iTunes update). When I restarted the computer, I was prompted to give my login and password -- which is strange, because I don't have the System Prefs set to ask for one. Upon giving the info, the computer shook its head emphatically, and denied access.

I restarted using the system disc, and used the password utility to create a password (I've never had to do this before, and here is where I may have "screwed the pooch", to use the vernacular. Anyway, I subsequently had to log in as "System Administrator" using that password. I ran the disk utility, and while "verify disk" revealed no issues, there were a number of permissions errors that I've subsequently corrected. Thankfully, I got on to the computer and, again thankfully, all my data is intact.

However, what used to be my home folder is now relegated to "groups" status, and I can't log in as myself... The computer doesn't seem to recognize my Time Machine hard drive as the right drive for this computer, and I'm scared to dock my iPhone for fear of losing my contacts until I resolve the situation.

Can anyone tell me how I can restore the "groups" account to the administrator account? If it's of any help, that used to be the only account on the system...

Thanks in advance.

Grab a freebie called ACL Fix. Drop your hard drive icon on it so it will attempt to fix the entire drive. Give it time... running this for the whole drive may take a couple hours. With any luck, this will fix your problems. I do recommend having a backup on hand, just in case.

Thanks for the reply! I'm a little nervous to use the app -- the versiontracker links are down, and so is the developer website! That said, I did find the app at macupdate.com and have downloaded it. I'm backing up my hard-drive onto an external now, and unless I get another solution, I'll try ACL Fix when that's finished.

This happened with the 2008-005 Security Update?

I was just about to install that and now I'm having second thoughts...

Has this happened to anyone else?

Installed fine on my Mini (Intel) and my main eMac which obviously is PPC.....no issues.....yet lol

I'm afraid this does seem to be a problem. My friend installed the patch on his iMac running 10.5 and after the first reboot after installing the patch his machine refused to boot at all and he had to use the system disc to recover the hard drive.

I installed the patch but haven't yet rebooted so I don't know if I'm going to have the same issues. Personally i think this is serious and I'm suprised that Apple haven't released a fix yet...