I’m a linux (Debian) user whose wife recently got an iBook. She asked me about sharing files on her computer with an office mate of hers by creating a new group to which they both had permissions. In linux, this would be easy; however, I know enough about OSX to know that I don’t know enough to go mucking about in /etc. I tried locating info about it, but only came up with references to Mac Server software, which isn’t an option ($499! :eek: ). Then I found the NetInfo Manager application. Which was awfully nice (or maybe just awful), as within 5 minutes of attempting to add/duplicate a group, I had locked up the entire computer and had to hard boot (who knew that simply clicking on “Management” in the menu bar would have such dire results?). So, two questions:
[ol]
[li]How does one manage groups and their permissions on an OSX box?[/li][li]Is there a better way to share files/directories in OSX? (Obviously, I’d rather not have to tell my wife to make things world readable.)[/li][/ol]
Thanks for any help…
Just download Sharepoints from versiontracker. Make your life easier.
OK, I’ll give it a shot.
Is there no native way to manage groups?
The preferred way is to use the ‘NetInfo Manager’ utility application. I’m not sure why you locked up your machine. Perhaps this page can help?
You can do these things from the command line also, though it’s more cumbersome. To create a new group:
nicl / create /groups/NEWGROUP gid 1001
nicl / create /groups/NEWGROUP passwd '*'
To add a user to an extant group:
nicl / -merge /groups/NEWGROUP users JOHN PAUL GEORGE RINGO
To delete a group:
nicl / -delete /groups/NEWGROUP
In the above examples, things in all caps are placeholders of course. Also, I recommend the O’Reilly book Mac OS X for Unix Geeks if you think you’ll be doing a lot of programming or command-line work.