Password Required

[bythesea888]

Each time I want to trash a folder or document this is the message I get:

Finder wants to make changes. Type your password to allow this.

Where can I change that?
Sally T


Working on:
a Mac Air
OSX Lion 10.7.5 (11G63b)
1.8 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
2 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

 

[chas_m]

Sounds like you either have Secure Trash turned on, or you have set up a User account and don't have Admin privileges.

 

[Raz0rEdge]

The usual reason for this is that the Trash bin is no longer owned by you..you can confirm this by opening up a Terminal window and type in

ls -la ~/.Trash

You might see "root" in there as opposed your username, if that is the case the easiest fix is to remove the folder with

sudo rm -rf ~/.Trash

Now log-off and log back in and a new trash bin will be created for you and no longer require your password..

 

[vansmith]

Each time I want to trash a folder or document this is the message I get:

What folder are you trying to trash? A significant amount of the filesystem isn't meant to be tampered with manually.

If you're trying to remove things from your user directory, try Raz0r's first command and let us know what it prints (responds) back.

 

[bythesea888]

Sounds like you either have Secure Trash turned on, or you have set up a User account and don't have Admin privileges.

Secure Trash is not turned on.
In preferences I opened Users&Groups, there is my name and under it says Admin.
Other users:
Guest User
disabled

Before I do as the next post advises I would like to make sure of my settings and if I am in the right window.


Is Users&Groups the right place to be looking?

 

[vansmith]

Your user is set up as an admin so that's not the issue. Even if it wasn't, you'd still be able to delete a fair amount of content from places that are safe to do so.

 

[bythesea888]

Yes, I understand that - these are my written documents and folders.

What I don't understand now is where to find and open a Terminal window.

Please lead me to it.

 

[Raz0rEdge]

Applications->Utilities->Terminal is where it's sitting..

 

[bythesea888]

Just one more question before I do that. Will doing that allow me to throw away files I have no business messing with?

 

[Raz0rEdge]

Start with my first command, that is just your local trash bin. See what it says first and let us know. Based on what you see and what we recommend, you can proceed to my second command. Both of these are isolated to your home folder and to a folder that is "safe" to remove..

Realize that this action will essentially empty your trash bin for you and create a new one, so if you had anything in the trash bin that you wanted to save, you should do so before going through any of my commands..

 

[pigoo3]

Will doing that allow me to throw away files I have no business messing with?

This is part of the responsibility of being a computer user. You need to know what you're putting into the trash can. If you're not sure if you should be trashing a file...then don't put it into the trash can & empty it.

- Nick

 

[vansmith]

Just one more question before I do that. Will doing that allow me to throw away files I have no business messing with?

No and I'm pretty sure no one here would ever suggest something like that.

As Raz0r said, the first command just tells us a little about the Trash folder that may or may not be the root of the problem.