Lion Server Issues...Need to Revert Back

[Marilyn]

I am hoping someone here can give me some advice - I installed Lion server last week at the advice of a friend who is normally pretty tech saavy - the purpose of which was to be able to share files from my main computer and a laptop in my office where an intern is going to be working for a couple of weeks.

There have been nothing but problems ever since - it changed ALL the permissions on my files to read only. I changed the settings in Server to allow my user account (which is set up as an admin) and anyone connected to read and write and it STILL isn't allowing it to work - I have to go in and adjust this to every single folder I open and it's been a real pain to get any work done.

At this point, it is cutting into productivity and has been more trouble than it's worth. My system which hardly ever crashed before is having issues with apps crashing and then not restarting, etc. I already repaired the permissions on the start up disk...but at this point I really don't want to even bother with Server at this point - I will figure out a workaround for the intern.

In the meantime, I would like to reinstall the "regular" version of Lion on my system. The problem is that I would really prefer NOT to have to reformat my hard drive to do this, as it will take me forever to get everything back to the way I had it. (And I'm not sure if I can even restore from the Time Machine backup at this point - it shows me that I have no access to the folder that is in, and no matter what I do or adjust it will not let me change it)

So my question is...is there anyway for me to reinstall regular Lion without the reformat? I have a USB drive with Lion on it, if that makes a difference...

Thanks. Sorry to sound like a noob here but this is an issue I've never had to deal with before.

 

[robgendreau]

Hmm. You might be in luck. Has your Lion Server system backed itself up, and hence deleted your regular Lion backup? If you have a regular Lion backup that is essentially your old Lion setup I'd try to get back to that.

But I would definitely erase the current setup and either restore from your good plain Lion backup or migrate from it. If permissions have been changed on lots of your user stuff and you just install plain Lion (if indeed that is possible, and I kind of doubt there's an uninstall Server/install Lion option anywhere) you're gonna end up with the same mess. Why not go back to when you know things worked? You'll save time in the long run doing it right. It really doesn't take that long to reformat and migrate; restoring might be longer but I've never had to do it.

Make sure your back up is solid before doing anything. And you might even consider just installing/reinstalling/restoring or whatever your old system on another disk and running from that before committing to wiping out Lion Server. That might sound like overkill but having your business depend on the viability of one computer is kinda risky.

And once you go back to Lion just set up regular old file sharing and the intern as a different user. You really don't need Lion Server for two people who just need to share files (as I sure you know now...)

Rob

 

[Marilyn]

Unfortunately, it did back itself up - into that same folder which it will now not let me access. So my fear is that I will not be able to restore my system to when regular Lion was running fine.

I have another computer that I can work on while this is all going on, but the thought of having to nuke the drive and then also have to reinstall everything on the main workstation is just killing me...that is going to take me a whole bunch of time that I don't have

So, and I apologize if this is a stupid question but if I were to back up my system right now, say - wipe the hard drive and then migrate all my stuff from that backup, it will not grab the Lion server data and also move that? Because the last thing I need is for me to go through the whole process only to restore my system back to running Lion Server, because I definitely do NOT want that...

 

[Mal]

When you set sharing permissions, that sets the file permissions as well, as they are one and the same. Most likely there was an unintended change to those permissions. Try this:

Restart the computer and hold down Cmd-R when you hear the chime. This will boot into the recovery partition.
Choose Utilities -> Terminal from the menus.
Type "resetpassword" without the quotes and hit enter.
Choose the hard drive at the top, your user from the drop-down menu, then click Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACL's at the bottom.

Reboot and see if everything is working properly again, which is should be.

jW

 

[Marilyn]

When you set sharing permissions, that sets the file permissions as well, as they are one and the same. Most likely there was an unintended change to those permissions. Try this:

Restart the computer and hold down Cmd-S when you hear the chime. This will boot into the recovery partition.
Choose Utilities -> Terminal from the menus.
Type "resetpassword" without the quotes and hit enter.
Choose the hard drive at the top, your user from the drop-down menu, then click Reset Home Directory Permissions and ACL's at the bottom.

Reboot and see if everything is working properly again, which is should be.

jW

Thanks, I will give that a try before I go to plan B. Which I really don't want to have to do...and that's reformat and start over with a fresh copy of Lion.

If the permissions thing was the only issue, I could almost live with that. But now I am having an issue with constant quitting of apps and then they will not open again unless I reboot. I already tried Disk Utility a couple of times and it will be stable for a couple of hours...then start crashing again. So I really have no idea what is going on!

 

[Ccrew]

(And I'm not sure if I can even restore from the Time Machine backup at this point - it shows me that I have no access to the folder that is in, and no matter what I do or adjust it will not let me change it)

Your Time Machine backup is backed up to a folder on the machine you're on?

 

[Marilyn]

Your Time Machine backup is backed up to a folder on the machine you're on?

No...Time Machine backs up to an external drive which has nothing else on it at all besides backup stuff. For whatever reasons I am unable to access anything on that drive at all, and it will not let me change the permissions, either...at least not with all the tricks I have tried.

I did try restarting using Cmd S but that didn't work - I must have not pressed it at the right time. I will try it again later today - I still haven't nuked the drive so I am still hoping that someone knows a way I can not have to do that. The permissions problem I can live with, but the constant crashing of the machine now is not just frustrating and annoying but counter productive...last night I lost two files too - I created them, saved them to a folder on an external (not the Time Machine one, a different one) and when the machine crashed and I rebooted - they were GONE. So I now need to remake them, which really sucks!

 

[Mal]

No...Time Machine backs up to an external drive which has nothing else on it at all besides backup stuff. For whatever reasons I am unable to access anything on that drive at all, and it will not let me change the permissions, either...at least not with all the tricks I have tried.

I did try restarting using Cmd S but that didn't work - I must have not pressed it at the right time. I will try it again later today - I still haven't nuked the drive so I am still hoping that someone knows a way I can not have to do that. The permissions problem I can live with, but the constant crashing of the machine now is not just frustrating and annoying but counter productive...last night I lost two files too - I created them, saved them to a folder on an external (not the Time Machine one, a different one) and when the machine crashed and I rebooted - they were GONE. So I now need to remake them, which really sucks!

Note that it's not Cmd-S, but Cmd-R that I suggested. Not sure if you were responding to another suggestion, but just wanted to make sure.

jW

 

[chrfr]

This is the Apple documented process to get rid of Lion Server: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4827

This of course, won't fix the permissions already changed on your files but it'll at least get the operating system back to what you're used to.

 

[Marilyn]

Note that it's not Cmd-S, but Cmd-R that I suggested. Not sure if you were responding to another suggestion, but just wanted to make sure.

jW

Oh - it says Cmd S - did not try Cmd R. But will try that...

Thanks!

 

[Mal]

Oh - it says Cmd S - did not try Cmd R. But will try that...

Thanks!

You're correct. I fixed it for anyone who might try those steps in the future.

jW

 

[0penCr8]

Simple Issue

Just hold CMD-R at boot up, then when Mac OS X Utilities opens, click Reinstall Mac OS X Lion. That will not erase any of you stuff. It will just reinstall os.

Just to be safe, you might want to backup your data since it appears you are dealing with very important work-related files.

Jake