Internet Sharing

Hello mates

I've been fighting with this for a couple days now, and I'm starting to get desperate.

So here is the deal: I'm trying to share my Internet from Ethernet to other computers using Wifi. In the past, I have not had any problems doing this, it's just about checking the right boxes right?

Well, now, I have this iMAC with Mac OS X 10.7.5, and the problem is that all the checkboxes in the Settings -> Sharing -> Internet Sharing screen are disabled. I cannot check any of the boxes listing the ports I want to use to share my Internet. Therefore, I cannot check the box for Wifi and I cannot start the sharing service.

Have any of you solved such a weird problem? I called the Apple service, and they were unable to provide a solution...

This is the printscreen of what I see: http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/9659/vqe5.jpg

Thank you guys
J

Did you unlock the lock with your admin password?

Hi mate! Thanks, and yes I did; I have admin rights on this iMac. Im not a super user, but I have admin rights indeed. I have a local admin user, and a network admin user, and it-s the same for both... What do you think?

And you're sure your computer is connected to the Internet by an Ethernet connection and not Wi-Fi?

Absolutely sure... iMac is connected to Ethernet, other devices would connect to Internet through the iMac via wifi. Weird isnt it??? And this sucks because I want to set up a proxy in the iMac, and if the sharing is not working, I'm hopeless!

Have you run any maintenance lately? Might be time to do that. We recommend Onyx or its sibling Maintenance as good, free solutions there.

Have you tried creating another admin account (just for troubleshooting), logging into that and seeing if it works there?

Yep! Even tried with a the account of a colleague... and nada again...

I just activated the root account and tried... SAME PROBLEM!

But it seems there is an antivirus installed (Symantec); could this be messing things up??

Personally I'd uninstall that. But at the very least temporarily disable it and try again

Thanks mrplow. Ill do that and post the results.

Here's another thought. Not sure if this is an issue but I think it's possible. Go into System Preferences and check the Network pane. Which interface is listed first Airport/Wireless or Ethernet? Make sure Ethernet is first.

I would bet it is the symantec software. Get rid of it.

Considering you have done the stuff you say yo do..

I uninstalled Symantec, repared the permissions with disk utilty, and nothing... this is frustrating... I even gave read and write permissions to everyone to the folder /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration, and the checkboxes are still locked... Im desperate...

Can you post a screenshot of your network page from system prefs and from the sharing page as above?

There is some progress.

I copied the file com.apple.nat.plist file to my SystemConfiguration folder from my Macbook pro, where I have the settings for InternetSharing and it works. Then, on the iMac, the computer with the problem, I executed the command sudo launchctl load -w /System/Library/LaunchDaemons/com.apple.InternetSharing.plist on Terminal, and even though the checkboxes are still disabled, the Internet Sharing seems to be ON.

However, the sharing is not real because I see no new wifi network appearing, and the icon of the sharing (normally an up arrow) is not there (see the pictures)

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/541/0lhb.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/713/e38p.jpg/

F$%%&%^ THIS!!!! But thank you all... I will not rest until I fix this

Strange that it shows your wifi as connected. But now you've added that plist it kind of skews how it would've looked.

What happens if you disable the wifi?

If I disable the wifi and run the command, the wifi stays disabled, but the pane indicates that wifi sharing is on! crazy stuff huh?

It's confusing it copying that plist in. Can you delete it and restart. Then disable wifi and try again

no... it did not work; check out the image. now, if I execute the command on terminal, nothing happens... everything stays disabled, and nothing gets checked! GRRRR http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/843/p943.jpg/ (same result with wifi turned on)

and in Console, I see this message: 21/06/2013 18:15:33.615 com.apple.InternetSharing: port forwarding is allowed