No words of wisdom or stupidity today, good readers: My beloved Mac has decided to stop displaying icons correctly or allow me to drag and drop or perform other vital functions.
I’m not going to assume that it’s the Mac’s problem. Perhaps it’s something I’ve done. I’m tying to initiate some sort of dialogue, get my computer to share its feelings, see if we can’t work this thing out between the two of us. I don’t want to give it the idea that I think it’s “broken” just because it displays signs of difference.
Then, when all other avenues have been exhausted, I’ll attempt to “repair” it. Though I’d prefer to use the term “constructive developmental nurturing.”
[Damn. If only I weren’t so focussed on being so PC with my PC. Oh, the burdens of being a good liberal. See you all tomorrow.]
Fanny Roborat
17 comments
Thad
June 10, 2003 at 6:17 pm
1Adam,
You’re using OS X, right?
Get Cocktail. Go to the “Pilot,” check “run cron scripts” and “repair permissions,” then have it do its thing. Restart.
When you restart, hold down command-s. Whoa! Where’d all that black UNIX text come from? So that’s what OS X looks like with its clothes off… Wait a few moments until the command line prompt shows up. Then type “fsck -y” No, not “fcuk u,” that’s a stupid designer t-shirt. “fsck” stands for File System ChecK, and “-y” means “automatically answer ‘yes’ to any questions I may have for you while I’m checking your disk, such as ‘Dude, your file node count thing is totally bogus, should I, like, fix it for you?”
If the first fsck finds any problems, keep doing it until it tells you “The volume “Adam’s House of Porn” [or whatever you’ve named your HD] appears to be OK.” Then type “reboot” — which gives a chance for OS X to go put on her face again.
The Cocktail thing you should do once a month or so, the fsck only when you’re having problems.
Thad
June 10, 2003 at 6:19 pm
2Well.
That was fucked-up.
Let me try again.
Adam,
You’re using OS X, right?
Get Cocktail. Go to the “Pilot,” check “run cron scripts” and “repair permissions,” then have it do its thing. Restart.
When you restart, hold down command-s. Whoa! Where’d all that black UNIX text come from? So that’s what OS X looks like with its clothes off… Wait a few moments until the command line prompt shows up. Then type “fsck -y” No, not “fcuk u,” that’s a stupid designer t-shirt. “fsck” stands for File System ChecK, and “-y” means “automatically answer ‘yes’ to any questions I may have for you while I’m checking your disk, such as ‘Dude, your file node count thing is totally bogus, should I, like, fix it for you?”
If the first fsck finds any problems, keep doing it until it tells you “The volume “Adam’s House of Porn” [or whatever you’ve named your HD] appears to be OK.” Then type “reboot” — which gives a chance for OS X to go put on her face again.
The Cocktail thing you should do once a month or so, the fsck only when you’re having problems.
Landis
June 10, 2003 at 7:19 pm
3Gee, Adam, if only you had a Windows machine….
You’d have experienced problems like this long ago and know how to address them.
Good luck and take notes. If it ever happens to me, I’m coming to you for the solution.
Charles
June 10, 2003 at 8:02 pm
4You mean to tell me that Macs aren’t infallible? Wow, no kidding?
Dee
June 10, 2003 at 8:32 pm
5I’ve found that eye contact and frequent, empathetic nods go a long way. Until there’s a double steal and you shout “WhooooooooHoooooo!”
Screws ya every time.
t.a.
June 11, 2003 at 12:18 am
6is this the OS X version of rebuilding the desktop? i mean, the ancient & proven solution to this problem is restart holding down apple & option, then rebuild when asked. i guess with unixiness of OS X, it must be different.
as for the infallible part: with a pc, this kind of problem would be total disaster. with my mac (os 9.2), it’s a minor glitch that i fix in minutes — and it happens once or twice a year.
Don
June 11, 2003 at 1:56 am
7I hate it when I can’t drag and drop.
Elliott
June 11, 2003 at 2:03 am
8Heck, because the Mac is an “Energy Star” machine, you could just leave it on all the time. That would be a good solution if you were not a liberal and worried about the tiny amount of energy wasted when it is asleep. Does anyone know if the startup wastes more energy than leaving on all the time? Thad, maybe you know this one.
Thad
June 11, 2003 at 2:40 am
9Actually, UNIX is *intended* to be on all the time. It has daily, weekly, and monthly scheduled maintenance routines that keep things running smoothly, and if your computer is off or sleeping, they don’t happen. That’s one of the the things Cocktail lets you do — run those maintenance routines (aka “cron scripts”) manually.
Booting into single-user mode (by holding down command-S) and running fsck isn’t quite like rebuilding the desktop (which is no longer necessary, or even possible, in OS X). It’s more like running Disk First Aid. In fact, it’s *exactly* like running Disk First Aid, except that once OS X has fully booted, Disk First Aid can’t repair the startup volume. So by booting into single-user mode, you can intercept the system before it gets going and safely verify/repair the startup disk. It’s also a cool look at what’s going on “under the hood” in OS X.
As for power usage in sleep mode, on modern machines it’s totally negligible, not much more than the trickle you’d be using if you shut the computer down but left it plugged in. (There’s that hypnotically pulsating power light, but that’s doesn’t require much juice… ) Anyway, there’s definitely no need to ever shut down a Mac running OS X (unless you’re unplugging and moving it), just put it to sleep instead.
I *have* noticed that there’s a difference between the scheduled “Energy Saver” sleep and actually choosing “Sleep” from the Apple menu — the latter turns the fan off and puts you in power-saving “Deep Sleep.” The former is more like a light nap — the fan stays on, etc.
As for the platform wars, all I’m gonna say is that one of the nice things about OS X is that if you’re having disk problems, you usually don’t need expensive commercial software like Norton or whatnot to fix it. Cocktail is freeware, fsck is built-in to the UNIX subsystem — and the two of them are capable of solving virtually all of your commonly-encountered problems.
OJ
June 11, 2003 at 5:59 am
10man… i wasnt ready for that. then all the hot advice, and words of encouragement. it was too much for me.
Ben
June 11, 2003 at 9:26 am
11I am going to have to book mark this post just for the comments. The community is the best using a mac. It’s like being in the rebel alliance or something.
Murray
June 11, 2003 at 9:58 am
12That’s the problem with you weak-kneed liberals; you don’t know the value of serious punishment. Instead of understanding and nurturing a recalcitrant computer back to life you need to do what has been so successful with children and criminals; bludgeon them until you’re satisfied that they have learned their lesson. If we can stop drug traffic in it’s tracks by sending casual tokers to prison for life, tell me why that won’t work on a Mac. When after a few good whacks you have it cowering in a corner, you’ll know what I mean.
adam
June 11, 2003 at 11:26 am
13Thad -
thanks so much… BUT…
I’d already downloaded Cocktail. So I performed the things you suggested. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. the one thing I noticed was that the fsck manuever produced only a few line of text, always followed by the same “unexpected” exception.
Hmmm. I may just reinstall.
Susie
June 11, 2003 at 4:59 pm
14Sorry it didn’t work.
Still, something sexy about a dude named “Thad” talking about a Mac strip tease.
Or is that just me?
Yeah, it’s just me.
t.a.
June 11, 2003 at 5:17 pm
15the name “thad” invariably reminds me of innumerable gary larson “far side” cartoons. few of which featured stripping.
(sorry, thad. i should talk)
Thad
June 11, 2003 at 5:18 pm
16Unfortunately, it didn’t work. the one thing I noticed was that the fsck manuever produced only a few line of text, always followed by the same “unexpected” exception.
Adam… shhhh! You’re blowing it for the team, here.
Okay… if fsck doesn’t solve your problem, and keeps returning the same error, you have joined the ranks of the unlucky few OS X users who require more serious disk tools. You, uh, got Norton, TechTool, or Drive 10? Cause, uh, you might need em after all. (Way to make me look like a chump, there, big guy.)
Try this first, though: boot from your OS X install disk and run the Disk Utility from there. (You can access it from the Apple Menu.) If that returns the same error as fsck (and it probably will), you can either run one of the usual disk utilities, or [sigh] back up your user folder and reinstall. (”Archive and install” should do the trick, and saves the trouble of a doing complete, clean reinstall.)
Linux dude
June 15, 2003 at 9:10 pm
17err… Thad don’t say Unix(tm) say that Apple is based on Free BSD the Open group already sueing apple for using the copyrighted term UNIX to describe their OSX