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Mac OS X will not cause fragmented files = myth.

OutThere said:
That's actually entirely false. It's the first thing that makes sense to do, as a lot of the time, it actually fixes problems. When vital system files have corrupted permissions, they can't be run or accessed properly, and when they can't be run or accessed properly, what happens? Your computer doesn't work. Let's say you lose execute permissions on Finder.app, what happens? Your computer freezes right after login. Repairing permissions usually takes less than 15 minutes, and is your best bet as a first step in fixing problems.
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There are certain instances were repairing permissions could be useful, but not nearly as much as everyone would like to believe. What really erks me is that people repair permissions right before they run the installer to update their OS. Why in God's name would you do this??? The installer runs as root, and therefore doesn't care about wrong permissions.

OutThere said:
This is actually false too. How exactly does said virus move itself around on the network without being able to execute on the Mac? Things don't just sift off of your Mac onto other computers on the network randomly. They have to be able to run on your computer to put themselves on other computers.
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See above post. You're playing with fire, and you will get burned.
 
OutThere said:
Let's say you lose execute permissions on Finder.app, what happens? Your computer freezes right after login. Repairing permissions usually takes less than 15 minutes, and is your best bet as a first step in fixing problems.
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My past usage of repairing permissions has done anything for me, but hey, everyone's mileage varies. Actually, repairing permissions always tells me something is wrong, so I gave up on it.

Hypothetical question in your case above. If you lose the execute bit on Finder.app, how do you repair permissions?
 
belvdr said:
Hypothetical question in your case above. If you lose the execute bit on Finder.app, how do you repair permissions?
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Boot from an OS X CD and run Disk Utility from there.
 
Randall said:
See above post. You're playing with fire, and you will get burned.
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Nice. Any chance of please moving it back over to the topic of defragmentation? We have to rotate our dead horses so that no particular one gets beaten too severely. :)
 
mad jew said:
That's it. Defragging is the Windows answer to repairing permissions. It's the first thing people do when something isn't quite right but it rarely helps to do it so often (although repairing permissions is admittedly slightly more useful).
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You're not kidding there lol........... I've defragemnted by Win ME PC LOTS of times... its fixed minor problems.. when it actually works ( I have to go into safe mode to do it) However, i've never noticed it making the slightest difference in speed.
 
Strangely, I just (within the last hour) had the ownership in the Dock.app change in CoreServices for a user and the Dock became unusable. Really strange. Permissions Repair to the rescue.
 
Les Kern said:
WARNING: NEVER, EVER run repair permissions from a boot disk.
It does not use the receipt files located on your hard drive to properly set permissions for updated software.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25751
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This is a good point under most circumstances, but it doesn't really answer the posters question... if that hypothetical situation occurred, which Dr. Q was addressing, where the computer could not boot because finder.app execute permissions were not granted, then I don't think there is any alternative, except to repair disk permissions using the install / restore DVD, boot from the "repaired" disk, that probably has a number of erroneous permissions, but probably has the correct finder.app permissions now, and then repair permissions again properly. Or else, is there an alternate way to fix that hypothetical issue?

(If you're still booted in and this happens, then it's easy to fix in the normal way, of course, or if nothing else, by temporarily putting 777 permissions on finder.app from terminal....)
 
Randall said:
C'mon, if you're sharign it on the network, then a PC user might have access to it, and contract it that way. The point is, why would you not want to remove harmful code from your Mac? Just because your Mac is immune, doesn't mean you should let it lay dorment on your HD.
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My point was that if you plug your unprotected Mac into the network, the other computers will not just start getting viruses randomly. If you start copying files, then it is the PC owner's responsibility to have his insecure computer protected.


Back OT: It's relatively easy to fix permissions like that using single-user mode, if you lost the Finder.app, you could launch single user mode, mount your hard disk, and do:

chmod 777 /System/Library/CoreServices/Finder.app

then run Disk Utility when you got back in.
 
Randall said:
Ah yes the conspiracy theory that they're out to get the suckers. I love it. While there is some truth to your statement (OS X does defragment on the fly, to an extent) what about the other 64% of the disc that is still fragmented? Yeah you could just go open up all of those files and the OS will automatically defrag those ones, but then the previous ones that you opened will start to fragment again as you go along, making an infinite loop of no progress.
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You've got your brain muddled up quite a bit here.

It DOES NOT MATTER whether a file is fragmented or not as long as you don't open it. Who cares? Are you a slave to meaningless statistics? Do you jump because some stupid utility program says "64 percent, bad bad bad harddisk"?

If it were true that 64 percent of all files on your harddisk are fragmented (which, to be honest, I very much doubt), then the correct action to take on MacOS X is to do NOTHING. Why would you want to defragment files that you don't open? And those that you DO open will be defragmented automatically.
 
Counterfit said:
OS X only does that for files under 25MB.
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Still, if I never USE the files it's kind of pointless to cry that those files are fragmented. I try to keep video on my external drive anyways. So that helps.
 
Randall said:
Yeah you could just go open up all of those files and the OS will automatically defrag those ones, but then the previous ones that you opened will start to fragment again as you go along, making an infinite loop of no progress.
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How do you propose that files on a hard drive that are not being opened and/or modified, become fragmented??

You open it, it is defragged (if it is under 25 Mb). You save it. How does it then get fragmented again before the next time you open it?
 
Les Kern said:
WARNING: NEVER, EVER run repair permissions from a boot disk.
It does not use the receipt files located on your hard drive to properly set permissions for updated software.
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=25751
Click to expand...
Are you sure about this warning? My understanding is that if the receipt files for Package X are not used, it merely means that Repair Permissions ignores those files. Specifically, if a "Bill of Materials" file is used, the files it points to are checked for the indicated permissions. Otherwise, nothing "points to" these files so they are not checked nor their permissions changed. So running Repair Permissions from an OS X boot CD should not affect other applications you have installed on the target disk.

With the O.S. itself and the apps that ship with it, permissions on critical files are likely to be the same in Bill of Materials files on the boot disk and the disk you are repairing, even if software versions don't match, so I'd be surprised if it harms anything to Repair Permissions from the O.S. install disk. If there are minor differences, they could be corrected by rerunning Repair Permissions from the target disk once it is operational again. And it sounds like that's a good idea.
 
gnasher729 said:
You've got your brain muddled up quite a bit here.

It DOES NOT MATTER whether a file is fragmented or not as long as you don't open it. Who cares? Are you a slave to meaningless statistics? Do you jump because some stupid utility program says "64 percent, bad bad bad harddisk"?

If it were true that 64 percent of all files on your harddisk are fragmented (which, to be honest, I very much doubt), then the correct action to take on MacOS X is to do NOTHING. Why would you want to defragment files that you don't open? And those that you DO open will be defragmented automatically.
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Everyone knows that fragmented files slow you down. If your files have to be defragmented when you open them, they slow you down. Just because you never touch file X, doesn't mean a thing. As soon as you DO click on file X, then you sit and wait while the OS looks for the pieces all over your hard disc. File fragmentation, while a fact of life, still can slow down performance. If you don't notice it then fine great. But if you DO notice it, then you should do something about it.

Happy Chanukah by the way.
 
I repaired permissions on a Tiger machine using a Panther install disk and noticed no explosions nor curses. I'm telling you right now, you can repair the permissions from the install disks and it will do no harm. It will not have the desired repairing permissions effect, but it won't break anything. :)
 
For the record, you won't "harm" anything by repairing permissions booted from the CD. In some cases this may be your only option. However, since the BOMs in the Receipts on the CD are incredibly out of date, "strange things" can happen (or not happen) because of incorrect permissions. Plus, you put yourself at a security risk. So if you do have to repair from the CD, it's is highly advisable that you correct those permissions be re-running it locally as soon as possible.
 
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