h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi zoomer!

I thought I'd left you a message yesterday, but obviously not. She says you may be able to advise me.

I have a Mac, which crashed disasterously a week or so ago. I've had to reinstall Panther and I've lost all my previous files, including my photos and my e-mail addresses.

I can't reinstall my digital camera's software - no idea why, but it says there is a problem. When I've done a search, I can find the files, but I can't open them. My computer has me as a different person - slightly different name. Any ideas on how I can get my files back?

Hideho, Zarquon!

Tough one. You may have a lot of problems because you've essentially created a parallel *user* in the new system.

Have you tried using iPhoto instead of your camera's software? It has a default for just about every major brand and some one's that are universal as well. Try opening iPhoto and searching with it, and use the plain old *find* to look for a picture you are missing that you know the name of. When you do that, go into *add criteria* and select *visibility*, then chose *all*. Be careful when you do that though, because if you accidentally delete anything that you've made visible it can be disasterous. When you find the picture, look at the root of where it is, what file and where in the computer. Double click on the *back end* and you may find them all.

Have you tried logging out and then logging back in again with your old name and password?

I'm sure most of these are things you may have already done or thought of, but I hope they help.

C

I just re read that and I meant to seperate iPhoto from *find*. They are two different things, by *find* I meant the plain old ordinary search in the finder.

Also, when you go into System Preferences and then Accounts, are you the only user? If so, you may have a hidden user and again using *find* with invisibility off to find the other user might help.

Good luck.

Zoomer

Hi zoomer,

I worked out that I'm now a separate user from the one I was before, as I wasn't allowed to call myself by the same name. I've never changed my main password, although I couldn't log in as previously. I don't know if I said so, but the problem I had was so bad that I could only access a black screen with white lettering (a bit like dos), which really worried me.

I have downloaded new photos to iPhoto, but I have no access to previous photos - most of them weren't named other than by the letters and numbers which get allocated to them.

I haven't tried searching in iPhoto, but I will - and I'll let you know the outcome.

The *back end*? What's that?

By the *back end* I just meant that if you found a particular photo you could follow the folders back until you found the one with what you want in it. It could be as close as the folder you find the photo in or as far back as the program that holds that folder. Can you remember any photo that might have a name other than it's origin number? With the invisibility off I believe you could access some of the *other* users files.

Tough one. The screen you're talking about is probably Unix and that is far beyond my knowledge. Sorry I can't help more but at least if you find someone who can tell you how to get into your old user space I'm certain the photos are still there. They wouldn't corrupt just because the OS did.

btw, I'm much less intelligent than the people here: A690653

You might want to ask them!

Thanks, zoomer - I do appreciate the advice - I'm searching now using one of my best friends' names - (I should have tried using my son's name - I'll try that if this one doesn't come off.

Now there's an idea, Zarquon, you might want to try Alji: U172782

I'm sure he is way smarter than zoomer!


Just teasing, zoomer honey!

On the other hand, Alji has never thought I was a man.



az

Will I be apologising for that for the rest of my life?



Most people are smarter than me but age and guile always defeat youth and knowledge!

I asked the question for you (along with one of my own)at the Orchard and d'Elaphant(and Zeppo his dog) answered:

"I don't think the account itself is likely to get corrupted, rather something *in* the account - a plist file or login item application for instance, or if you are using FileVault maybe the home directory itself. You can try a few different ways of starting up to see what happens. Better yet, tell us more specifically what is happening when you try to log in, to help narrow things down.

1. Hold down the "shift" key while starting up. This puts you into "safe mode" and automatically runs some diagnostics (silently, it will seem to take forever to start up).
2. Start up from a CD (hold down the "c" key when a System CD is in the drive). If this is a G3, you should have a MacOS 9 CD, and that should give you access to look at the files on the drive and mess about with them (carefully, of course. You don't want to make things worse) without needing a login at all.
3. Hold down the "s" key (it might be "command-s") during start up, and that puts you in "single user" mode - not for the unix novice, since all you will have is the unix command line, but again you'll be able to mess around with the files to figure out what is wrong. Type "/sbin/shutdown -r now" to restart in normal mode.

Of course none of that is necessary if you have second account that you can log in using that, then access various system tools to fix the first account. The works especially nicely if the second account has "admin" access, but even if it doesn't you should be able to access the admin tools by typing the username and password of the admin account when prompted. There's a lot of "ifs" here, so let us know what your situation is, but if you can do this, then create a new user account and move all the important files from the "corrupt" one to the new account (through terminal using "sudo" and the command line, or by enabling "root" login using NetInfo Manager then logging in as root, etc. etc.). Lots of options."

OK?

Thanks zoomer! I'll give it a try.

I tried searching on a name earlier, but didn't have the time to wait for the search to finish - it was taking so long. I'll have a proper look at the advice this evening.

Hi az!

I'm getting little to take a couple of pics, so should have something to send you shortly.

Just bought a used Titanium laptop and traded in my trusty Bondi blue clamshell. She'll be missed but this thing is awesome! Keep in touch with your Mac probs.



C

Ohh!

I did try finding myself under my previous user name, but couldn't find anything. I think I had to erase the previous corrupt volume to reinstall Panther. I'm just doing another search - thanks for the prompt!

Nope - nothing - as though I never existed!

Consider yourself reborn! A new person!

I've exhausted my limited knowledge on the subject, but I'd love to hear if you ever find a solution. I'd be hanging by a fingernail 10 stories above a pool of frickin' sharks with lasers on their heads if I lost my files.