OS 10.5.8 imac
I bought the disk warrior 4.1.1 upgrade which is DVD Rev. 904

The check box for repair permissions is grayed out.
If I use DW from apps, the check box is okay.
I repaired permissions with disk utility but the problem remains.
Does anyone else have this problem?
Any ideas?
jaybass

You're saying that if you boot from the DW CD, the check box for Repair Permissions is grayed out? Sorry, I just wanted to clarify that. You're also saying that it works from the copy that is installed in Applications? (BTW, Alsoft recommends installing it in /Applications/Utilities although that's not as crucial as in previous versions.) Did you select the hard drive in the DW window while booted from the CD? If you had the CD selected, then you can't repair permissions on it because its a locked system. (That's what I suspect is actually happening.)

If I'm wrong about selecting the CD, you may have a defective CD. Contact Alsoft for information and a possible replacement. Have you tried upgrading to DW 4.2? You can do it via free download here. DW 4.2 works noticeably faster than 4.1.1.

The problem may be that the OS on your Disk Warrior disc is older than the OS on the drive you are repairing. When that is the case you will be unable to run Repair Permissions although you can perform the other DW functions.

You need to repair permissions from the same operating system version as the drive that contains the permissions you want to repair.

I went through this myself and found that, if you call DW Customer Service, they will provide you will a disc containing a compatible OS for about 20 bucks including shipping. Otherwise you can continue to use Disk Utility for repairing permissions.

ryck

I think it unfortunate that Alsoft even bothered to <ahem> enhance DiskWarrior by including permission repairs.

Perhaps they were trying to get out from under that "one trick pony" rug... but, permissions!? Historically (say from 10.3.4... and all through Tiger... and apparently Leopard too), even Apple has said that perms should be repaired while booted normally (i.e., from the HD... unless it's an emergency): Scroll down and read the part under: "Should I start up from a Mac OS X install disc to repair disk permissions?"

And -- AFAIK -- neither DiskWarrior, nor Cocktail, nor OnyX, nor AppleJack, nor any other permissions repair tool does anything special (i.e., different). They all call /usr/sbin/diskutil repairPermissions / -- and that kicks off a whole series of internal processes involving characters such as...

/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/Install.framework/Resources/installdb
/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DiskManagement.framework/Versions/A/Resources/DiskManagementTool
/usr/libexec/repair_packages --output-format 1 --repair --standard-pkgs --volume /

...and probably others.

We don't need DiskWarrior to be repairing permissions. If there was some problem logging in, i'd rather use AppleJack from single-user mode. (needs to be installed ahead of time however).

-HI-

Excellent observation, and well-stated!

Ah the good ol' days: "Re: What is the BEST Way To Repair Permissions?"

[actually, that whole thread was interesting and fun (not just the post i linked to) especially Mark Douma's closer {wherein cyn also placed a link to dkmarsh's "Repairing Permissions FAQ" thread}.]

Oy vey, i'm feeling faklempt all of a sudden.

> The problem may be that the OS on your Disk Warrior disc is older than the OS on the drive you are repairing. When that is the case you will be unable to run Repair Permissions although you can perform the other DW functions.

Are you certain about that? (I think you've got a coupl'a different situations mixed up.)

The only problem with DiskWarrior discs noted by Alsoft is that older ones do not include a (boot) version of OS X that allows them to boot Macs other than those they were originally capable of booting; any updated version of DW can run all its functions on any Mac with which it is compatible from any bootable volume other the volume on which it is located.

(Alsoft cannot release updates to correct the non-boot situation, because that would involve d/l'ing a version of an OS X operating system, which Apple does not allow [even the stripped-down version included with DW].)

> You need to repair permissions from the same operating system version as the drive that contains the permissions you want to repair.

"Repair Permissions" should be run while booted from your HD, not your OS X install disc, because the two use different permission databases (unless you're still running the same version of OS X as is on your disc), but I doubt there's any such issue with DW, because I expect it uses the db it finds on your HD.

I hope this was clearly stated

That's not quite accurate. No matter where you run Repair Permissions from, the database used is the same—that found in Library/Receipts/ on the volume whose permissions are being repaired.

The difference lies in the version of Disk Utility doing the repairing. From the Apple Support document Hal linked to above:

Yes, booting up from DW the permissions check box is grayed out.
From apps I meant utilities.
Did select the HD whilst booted from DW.
I got a reply from Alsoft saying that the upgrade cannot repair permissions because DW 4.1 is still on the old system when using the the DVD Rev. 904 upgrade. Everything else works though.

However, I created the new DW 4.2 CD and it burnt and verified
okay but it will not boot from the new CD.
The screen lights up for 20 secs and then goes black for 5
secs and it repeated itself for 5 mins. I rebooted again but with the same result.

I have emailed Alsoft to see what they say. I will let you
know if their answer would be of interest to someone.
Thanks for info Jon and for all the other responses.

jaybass

It's possible but I don't think so. My situation was an upgrade to 4.1.1 only to find Repair Permissions greyed out. I don't often run the Repair Permissions function and, when I do, I use Disk Utility.

However the fact that a function that previously worked, but was not now working, caused me to wonder "Do I actually have a compatible DW disc?" When I posed the question to their technical people I got this response:

"Yes, DiskWarrior 4.1.1 gives DiskWarrior compatibility with Mac OS X 10.5.x (Leopard).

However, this is not an issue of compatibility with Leopard.

You need to repair permissions from the same operating system version as the drive that contains the permissions you want to repair.

Your DiskWarrior disc and your computer's hard drive have different versions of the operating system."

ryck

Precisely.

And also, the /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DiskManagement.framework item is where a lot of updated perms info used to go (in Panther and Tiger anyway). The article doesn't bother to mention that detail, probably just to keep the explanation simple.

Although i'm still struggling to fully understand Leopard's new perms repair setup (vis-à-vis software updates), my guess is they could find a way to put all that info right in /Library/Receipts somewhere... so that it wouldn't matter what version of Leo/SL was running, the proper info would be right there (thus DVD booting would be fine -- albeit still abysmally slow, compared to single-user mode). But, the current state-of-the-"art" of Leo's perms repair seems so screwy now, somehow... i detest even thinking about it. [will be leaving Leo for SL in a month or three anyway.]

As a further wrinkle, the Snow Leopard installer deletes the contents of /Library/Receipts/db and /Library/Receipts/BSD.pkg, convincing all pre-Snow Leopard versions of Disk Utility that you have no unix, and therefore no OS, on that volume.

Other than gutting those two folders, Snow Leopard seems to ignore /Library/Receipts entirely, at least when installing/updating the OS itself. (Third-party installs, and optional Apple installs like XCode, do update /Library/Receipts/InstallHistory.plist, but only to the extent of recording that the install was done.) I haven't figured out where Snow Leopard stores permissions information now, mainly because I've stopped caring about permissions "repair".

The .bom files in Snow Leopard are in /private/var/db/receipts.

Thanks for the clarification.

> Yes, booting up from DW the permissions check box is grayed out.
[....]
Did select the HD whilst booted from DW.
I got a reply from Alsoft saying that the upgrade cannot repair permissions because DW 4.1 is still on the old system when using the the DVD Rev. 904 upgrade. Everything else works though.

Hmmm... After some rereading I see that you were talking about apples and I...oranges; my DW 4.2 disc (upgraded from my original 3.0 disc) can't boot my MacBook, and I never booted my iBook G4 from it after upgrading from Panther to Leopard.

(Here are links to two pages on Alsoft's website that offer an almost incomprehensible jumble of info, including, in the first one, on "Repair Disk:"

System Requirements and DiskWarrior 4 Support)

> However, I created the new DW 4.2 CD and it burnt and verified
okay but it will not boot from the new CD.
The screen lights up for 20 secs and then goes black for 5
secs and it repeated itself for 5 mins. I rebooted again but with the same result.

If you were able to boot from your DW 4.1 disc but are unable to do so from your newly burned 4.2 disc something may have gone wrong with your burn despite the verification (which I've experienced), and I suggest that you try it again; your new disc should boot any Mac that your old one booted.

If you'd care to try a test, insert your 4.2 disc in your optical drive, control-click on its icon, select "Duplicate," and let us know whether the duplication completes.

Sorry for the earlier confusion.

Hope this helps.

I did select "duplicate" and it copied it to my desktop without any hesitation.

I then burnt it to a CD and then rebooted from it, but with the same results.

Alsoft emailed me yesterday asking for a full profile which I have sent. I hope to receive an answer soon.

However, if the issue cannot be resolved without buying another disk, then I'll just repair permissions using DU.
Alsoft tells me that whatever software you use, the procedure is the same for repairing permissions.

I'll keep you posted.

jaybass.

Perhaps they were trying to get out from under that "one trick pony" rug

tho arguably, they do that trick very well...

Absolutely... and i'm all in favor of them focusing on (just) that.

> I then burnt it to a CD and then rebooted from it, but with the same results.

I wouldn't have suggested that you waste the disc; I was wondering whether "Duplicate" would return an I/O error as some discs I've seen that have been "verified" after burn have done.

Sorry for not being clearer.

Artie,
After 5 emails from Alsoft, I now have the last word regarding the DW 4.1.1 upgrade.
My original disk is a CD. Will not boot my imac.
I purchased the DVD Rev. 904 upgrade...boots okay but not for permissions.
I Created the DW 4.2 using my original disk (CD) as per Alsofts instructions.
It will not boot. I was then told to create DW 4.2 using the DVD Rev, 904 upgrade that I purchased.
It boots okay but the permissions box is still grayed out.
Alsoft says that to repair permissions I must use DW in utilities.
Boot from the disk for everything else.
I guess there is no DW disk that repairs permissions booting from the disk.
If Alsoft had said from the beginning to create version 4.2 from the DVD upgrade and that permissions could not be used when booting from the disk, that would have saved me a lot of time.
This for those who may have the same problem.
jaybass

Thanks for bringing this to a close, jaybass.

> I was then told to create DW 4.2 using the DVD Rev, 904 upgrade that I purchased.
It boots okay but the permissions box is still grayed out.

In that case, your original DW 4.2 Rev. 904 disc would have booted your iMac; DW upgrades cannot make a non-bootable disc bootable; the repairing permissions issue is still confusing, but I haven't got a disc with which to investigate.

> If Alsoft had said from the beginning to create version 4.2 from the DVD upgrade and that permissions could not be used when booting from the disk, that would have saved me a lot of time.

Since you're running OS X 10.5.8, upgrading from DW 4.1.1 to 4.2 was unnecessary, and I just found this on VersionTracker's DW 4.1.1 page:

"Version 4.1.1 restores the ability to use DiskWarrior to repair permissions while started from Mac OS X 10.5.5." (Emphasis added)

I wonder what that-all means in English?