There seems to be a lot of problems being posted of late where the person either doesn't know how or doesn't know about repairing disk permissions. Therefore I am writing a short explanation and guide.
If you are having any weird problems with OSX 10.2 (i.e. mouse fails to work, applications don't open, documents don't open, etc..) the most likely cause is a corrupted disk permission. Because of OSX's multiuser environment disk permissions have become an all necessary evil. They provide security for each user against improper use by another user on the computer. If by chance one of these permissions is corrupted your computer can exhibit unusual behaviors as listed above. The exact reason of the corruptions is not clear to me and I hope Apple comes through with a permanent fix very soon it's starting to bother me.
Okay you have a problem. For most common disk permission errors you can simply open up the disk utility application that can be found in your applications/utilities folder. Once open you will have a window presented to you with a row of tabs at the top. Click on the tab that says, "First Aid". Once you have selected the First Aid tab you need to select the drive to be repaired. To do this click on the image of your drive in the left of the window. Now that you have selected your drive the options to verify or repair disk permissions will now be active. I recommend just clicking on repair as verifying will just be an extra step and will waste time. Once Disk Utility is finished it will say something about being complete. You can now quit the program and you will have to restart your computer for the fixes to really take affect.
On occasion I have found that the repairing of permissions from the active system finder to be ineffective in correctly clearing all corrupted files. To do a more affective repair of disk permissions place your 10.2 installation disk in your cd drive and restart you computer. The moment your computer shutsdown and begins to restart hold the C key down until the Apple Logo is visible on the screen. Once you have started up off of the installation disk go to the menu bar and select the menu selection labeled, "Installation". With that menu open scroll down and select Disk Utility. The rest of the process is as stated above. Restart your computer.
I hope this helps a few people out. If you have any questions feel free to post a question here.
If you are having any weird problems with OSX 10.2 (i.e. mouse fails to work, applications don't open, documents don't open, etc..) the most likely cause is a corrupted disk permission. Because of OSX's multiuser environment disk permissions have become an all necessary evil. They provide security for each user against improper use by another user on the computer. If by chance one of these permissions is corrupted your computer can exhibit unusual behaviors as listed above. The exact reason of the corruptions is not clear to me and I hope Apple comes through with a permanent fix very soon it's starting to bother me.
Okay you have a problem. For most common disk permission errors you can simply open up the disk utility application that can be found in your applications/utilities folder. Once open you will have a window presented to you with a row of tabs at the top. Click on the tab that says, "First Aid". Once you have selected the First Aid tab you need to select the drive to be repaired. To do this click on the image of your drive in the left of the window. Now that you have selected your drive the options to verify or repair disk permissions will now be active. I recommend just clicking on repair as verifying will just be an extra step and will waste time. Once Disk Utility is finished it will say something about being complete. You can now quit the program and you will have to restart your computer for the fixes to really take affect.
On occasion I have found that the repairing of permissions from the active system finder to be ineffective in correctly clearing all corrupted files. To do a more affective repair of disk permissions place your 10.2 installation disk in your cd drive and restart you computer. The moment your computer shutsdown and begins to restart hold the C key down until the Apple Logo is visible on the screen. Once you have started up off of the installation disk go to the menu bar and select the menu selection labeled, "Installation". With that menu open scroll down and select Disk Utility. The rest of the process is as stated above. Restart your computer.
I hope this helps a few people out. If you have any questions feel free to post a question here.