Timemachine - permissions

[Lorraine.gaunt]

Hello - I've just had the hard drive changed in my macbook and it is working well. However I now need to restore a couple of folders from my timemachine backup. Timemachine won't allow me to do this, saying I don't have permissions. I've tried going to disc utility, but the permissions buttons for timemachine are greyed out. What can i do?

 

[chscag]

Welcome to the Mac Forums.

Let's try this:

Open each folder in turn that you wish to restore. Open them from within the Time Machine Finder. Command click (right click) and then select "Get Info". Click on the small lock at the bottom of the dialog box and enter your administrative password. The lock will open.

Select Read and Write permissions for yourself. Click the lock to close it. Close the dialog box. You'll need to do the above with each folder.
Now try to restore your folders.

 

[Lorraine.gaunt]

thanks for helping - when I do as you suggest though I can't get past the lock - which is 'greyed out'. The info box says I have custom access and can 'read and write'.

I have restored from time machine previously so the change does seem to be related to the change to the new hard drive.

 

[Lorraine.gaunt]

Sorry, more info.

I have (1) entered Timemachine (2)gone to the backup made prior to changing the hard drive (3) Chosen 'lorraine' (4)right clicked on documents etc, as you instructed.

When I look at sharing and permissions - this says 'no access'. User has read and write access, but that is greyed out to me - as is the lock. I'm not clear what I was looking at earlier.

If I look at timemachine in finder (without going further) I do have read and write access and can unlock. But progressing to the next folder (Backups.backupdb) - my name isn't there in sharing and permissions.

Hope you can help!

 

[chscag]

I did some digging around and it seems the problem you ran into is not uncommon. Take a look at this article which explains how to get things going again. The article is dated from 2008 and applies to Leopard but it should also help you to restore your data.

Here is the LINK.

 

[Lorraine.gaunt]

Thank you for that - I checked out the link but that looked rather overwhelming.

I took the Macbook, time machine and old hard drive back to the Repair shop which had fitted the new drive.

The solution was simple and fits with your original post. The missing step was that I wasn't listed and needed to be added as a user. Once the principal was established (of allowing me access) I was shown how to use the 'apply to enclosed items' from the dropdown (still in permissions and sharing' to make the change to all the backup folders).

Very many thanks for your time