Permissions on Users/Shared

I dont know all the hints to really help you. but try making the other use a admin as well that should help with files and folders. as for itunes and iphoto library i dont know what to suggest yet but i will learn from answers in your thread. give the two admin thing a shot. im sure you will get better help than what i have attempted to do for you.

 

I'm having this exact same problem in 10.4! I've found instructions for sharing a iPhoto library. You can find this by searching apple.com/support. Couple of options are to create a Disk Image or place the library on an external drive. I have yet to try either of these approaches.

But getting the Shared folder to work for regular file sharing is a problem. I have the same issue with files being available as read only. I thought files in Shared were supposed to inherit permissions of the Shared folder and I have set to read/write for System and Wheel.

I just found this, which may offer a solution through terminal, but was hoping to find a GUI solution since I am Unix challenged.

http://blog.getsnappy.com/2009/06/sharing-files-with-other-users-in-mac.html

Good luck and post if you find a solution or the above works for you.

 

I've not yet tried sharing my iPhoto library but I have myself and my wife using different accounts but sharing the same iTunes library on the same Mac. Here’s how I did it.

Make a folder called ‘Music’ in Users/Shared and move your iTunes library to this new folder. Ctrl + click on the ‘Music’ folder and select ‘Get Info’ from the list. Click on the padlock at the bottom of the ‘Get Info’ window and enter your password. Change the permissions as follows:

User Name (Me) – Read & Write
Wheel – Read & Write
Everyone - Read & Write

Now the next bit is very important. Click on the gear icon to the left of the padlock and choose ‘Apply to enclosed items’. You can now close the ‘Get Info’ window. In each user account create an alias to the new shared iTunes library in your User/Home/Music folder (the default location for iTunes music libraries). If an iTunes library already exist in either account you will need to delete this first (don’t forget to backup just in case .

And that’s it. Each account will now be able to access the same music library. One final thing which usually catches people out. You will need to tell iTunes to ‘Keep iTunes Music folder organised’ and ‘Copy files to iTunes Music Folder when adding to library’. To do this, simply open iTunes preferences, click on advanced and make sure both tick boxes are checked. This needs to be done in both user accounts.

The only slight down side of this method is that if I add any new music to the library then my wife has access but she isn’t able to change the info (artist name, album, track number etc…) as I am the owner of that music (the files have standard permissions applied when added so only I have Read & Write access). The same applies if my wife adds some music. This isn’t a problem for me as I’m the one who manages the library; my wife simply wants to be able to access it.

If you want to manually change the permissions so that both users can change info, simply navigate to the ‘iTunes Music’ folder which is located in Users/Shared/Music/iTunes/ and Change the permissions using the same method above, making sure you ‘Apply to enclosed items’.

If you want to know how to set things up so both users can change info on tracks without having to manually change permissions each times new music is added then this can be done, but it will require delving into ACL permissions.

 

Thanks CloudDweller. I haven't tried sharing iTunes library yet, but have had good luck with iPhoto.

I broke down and asked a MacGenius. He advised putting the iPhoto library in the Shared folder and changing permissions as you outline above for iTunes. He noted that once in awhile the permissions may spontaneously switch back and I may need to delete a small file in the iPhoto package. (Have since forgotten the file name.) But everything seems to be working so far after a few weeks though we have not tested entensively.