Home directory empty

Hello,
So i was connected with vnc to my Arch server and it was acting weird so I did a reboot. Now after the reboot my home directory is empty and I cannot start xfce4. I logged in with the root account and the home directory is still empty so its not the rights I think. How can I trace the problem on this I have no clue where to start. Everything was working great before the reboot.
Thanks in advance,
Slayeriq

Thanks that was the problem indeed, in /etc/ there where a couple of files called mtab~ and mtab.fuselock I removed these and now my home partition is mounted again.
Last edited by slayeriq (2011-07-08 18:10:15)

Similar Messages

Home directory is full - how do i delete? It doesn't look full

After my problems last week - i was able to reindex mail, but now I'm getting doubles of each email and then mail won't work because "my home directory is full"
How do i delete? Does it mean my home folder on my mailbox account, or my iBook?
Thanks, guys

How did you reindex your mail?
This error message indicates a problem with the Envelope Index file for the Mail.app.
With the Mail.app quit and using the Finder go to Home > Library > Mail > Envelope Index.
Delete the Envelope Index file and empty the Trash.
Copy the Mail folder (which contained the Envelope index file) and place the copy on the Desktop for backup purposes.
Launch Mail and you will be prompted to import all mailboxes in the Mail folder at Home > Library > Mail.
Select OK and allow the import process to complete. This isn't really importing anything but replacing the deleted Envelope Index file and reindexing all mailboxes.
This should resolve the "home directory is full" problem and after confirming all mailboxes and messages are available, you can delete the backup copy of the Mail folder placed on the Desktop.

Mail not opening, "Home directory is full" ???

I am unable to open my mail application. I'm getting the following error message:
"Mail cannot update your mailboxes because your home directory is full.
You must free up space in your home folder before using Mail. Delete unneeded documents or move documents to another volume."
I don't understand. When I check my home folder there is plenty of space.
Any help is greatly appreciated!
Thank you
Aaron Yassin

Hello Aaron.
With the Mail.app quit and using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail > Envelope Index.
Delete the Envelope Index file and empty the Trash.
Using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail. Copy the Mail folder and place the copy on your Desktop for backup purposes.
Launch Mail and you will be prompted to import all mailboxes available within the Mail folder at Home > Library > Mail.
Select OK and allow the import process to complete. It really isn't importing anything but replacing the deleted Envelope Index file and re-indexing (so to speak) all messages.
When completed and after confirming all mailboxes and messages are available, you can delete the copy of the Mail folder from the Desktop.

Mac Newbie - Problem opening Mail, says home directory is full

I am new to Mac so forgive my ingnorance. I have been using Mail with no problems but just now (and each successive time despite restarts), when I open Mail a box pops up that says
"Mail cannot update your mailboxes because your home directory is full. You must free up space in your home folder before using Mail. Delete unneeded documents or move documents to another volume."
I appreciate any help.
G-Mc

Try the following.
Quit the Mail.app first and using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail > Envelope Index. Delete the Envelope Index file and empty the Trash.
Copy the Mail folder and place the copy on the Desktop for backup purposes.
Launch Mail and you will be prompted to import all mailboxes located in the Mail folder at Home > Library > Mail.
Select OK and allow the import process to complete. This process isn't really importing anything but replacing the deleted Envelope Index file and re-indexing all mailboxes.
If this resolves the problem and after confirming all mailboxes and messages are available, you can delete the copy of the Mail folder placed on the Desktop.

Mail tells me my home directory is full,

When I start up Mail, I get the following message.
Mail cannot update your mailboxes because your home directory is full.
The only option is a quit button.
However, I have emptied every mail folder in the home directory, and moved a bunch of stuff off the hard drive (there is now over 7 gigs free). I have reinstalled mail from the install disk, and repaired permissions with Tech Tool.
Running 10.4.11 and WAS using mail 3. Any suggestions?

Hi David, and a warm welcome to the forums!
Couple of things to try...
In your home folder, try moving this folder to the Desktop...
/Library/Caches/Mail
http://www.hawkwings.net/2006/02/08/rebuild-your-database-and-speed-up-mailapp/
Move Envelope Index to the Desktop in...
/Library/Mail
Oh wait... are you using FileVault?

Mail will not open - error message says home directory is full

I am running 10.4.3 on a dual 800 PowerPC G4 with 1.5 GB SDRAM.
I also run 10.4.3 on one PowerBook G4 and 2 iBooks.
I retain on my computer a large number of email messages but have plenty of room in my .Mac file
I run several hundred email messages per day.
Three days ago when I attempted to open Mail, I rec'd error message "Mail cannot update your mailboxes because your home directory is full. You must free up space in your home folder before using Mail. Delete unneeded documents or move documents to another volume."
I have deleted many files from the home folder and moved others. I still get the same error message.
I have experienced no problems with accessing my mail using my PowerBook G4 with similar config and OS.
johncleek
Power Mac G4 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Try this:
Try the following:
With Mail quit and using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail.
Move the Mail folder to the Desktop.
Launch Mail and a new Mail folder (and account named folders within) will be created automatically.
All new mailboxes will be empty but if this allows the Mail.app to function properly, you can use the Import Mailboxes feature to import selected mailboxes or manually replace mailboxes from the old Mail folder one at a time to determine which mailbox was causing the problem

Can't delete folder I created in Home directory

I created a music folder as an alternate to iTunes in my Home directory. Recently it started acting funny: wouldn't open in finder, wouldn't allow me to rename it, and now won't let me move or delete it. I tried unlocking it and checked that I have read and write priveleges. Any suggestions?

I'm guessing that Finder keeps .trash open to know wether or not files have been added to it and update the Dock icon, right?No.
The visible 'Trash' you see in the finder is the union of all your trash folders. Each volume (potentially) contains a /.Trashes/ folder at its root level. Within that there are folders with UIDs as their name, 501 being the first 'normal user' and 0 being root. Your "/.Trashes/502" means you were booted from another volume at some time. However, that trash folder is empty, as you correctly deduced.
Your "123 bytes .. /Users/name/.Trash" is not empty, however, because of the size. "123" is not a valid size, either (must be a multiple of 34). So you have directory problems on your hard disk—you need to fix that with Disk Repair, from Disk Utility while booted from your Install disk: see Using Disk Utility and fsck to resolve startup issues or perform disk maintenance.
You will probably see an "Invalid Link Count" message, hopefully this is not so serious that Disk Utility can't repair it, but let us know.

Not able to remove 'emtpy home' directory entry

Hi
I'm trying to remove an Oracle 10.2.0.1.0 installation on a Linux system. My problem is, that I'm not able to remove an 'empty home' directory with the installer. The button 'Remove..' is grayed out.
The reason why I want to remove that directory is, that I want to do an installation into this directory again. But the requirements check of the installation fails because of this 'empty home' directory (which is actually deleted on the file system).
Does someone know where this information is stored on the filesystem or how I can force the installer to install in this directory anyway? BTW: I have also a 9.2 installation on the same system, but that's probably no problem.
Thanks!

Has this database been upgraded via the patch process? If so, run the installer from the patch directory, you can often get to the uninstall from there. It all has to do with oracle inventory and what it sees as your most recent install. After you have done the uninstall/remove, you can just go delete the directory and remaining contents -- there will not be much left.

Home directory file loss unresolved

I have made that apparently commonplace and disastrous error of trying to rename my home directory on the finder bar, and when I rebooted found that I had lost all documents and user settings. However, all the advice and suggestions on the topic I have found have not worked. I cannot locate any of the original documents or settings under any folders in my users folder, so when I rename these to the original name and login again, I am still not getting anything back. It feels as though all the docs have really gone. It has been automatically creating new folders, so now there are several. Only one has all the different folder categories (music, movies etc., the rest just have a "desktop" folder and a "library" folder. But even on the one with all the folder categories, those subfolders are empty (no sign of their original contents).
I may have complicated the situation after it first occurred (before I read anything) by creating a new user account with a different name, which I then deleted. I am now back to my original username, short name, home directory etc etc., but just no documents or settings. Do I need to do some kind of drastic recovery?
I am in panic-land. Maybe someone can set me straight.
thanks,
Barnaby

Hi Barnaby, and a warm welcome to the forums!
No idea what you rea or tried, but renaming them again & deleting ones is not good news at all.
Return to default desktop, apparent "loss" of home directory...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=107854
ChangeShortName...
http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/23494
Don't use the HD or boot from it until you get another bootable drive to install to and boot from for your best chances of recovery. Or another Mac with this one in Target Mode. Sometimes even if it doesn't mount, the following can possibly help.
For the fullest recovery, quit using the Mac at all, get an external FW drive to intall the OS to, then Boot from that drive & get Data Rescue II...
http://www.prosofteng.com/products/data_rescue.php
(Has a Free Demo to see if it could or not, but you'll need another drive to recover to).
Or FileSalvage...
http://www.subrosasoft.com/OSXSoftware/index.php?%20mainpage=product_info&productsid=1
to recover what you can.

Smc and smuser both put wrong home directory in /etc/passwd

Hello,
I'm trying to use 'smuser add' as an alternative to 'useradd' in a setuid script, using -d to specify a home directory other than the default. Unfortunately, although the directory is created in the right place, the default is written into /etc/passwd.
%smuser add -u sapadm -p ***** -- -d /appuser/inputs/tom -g sapusers -n tom -s /bin/sh
Loading Tool: com.sun.admin.usermgr.cli.user.UserMgrCli from localhost
Login to localhost as user sapadm was successful.
Download of com.sun.admin.usermgr.cli.user.UserMgrCli from localhost was successful.
% ls -al /appuser/inputs/tom
total 14
drwxr-x--- 2 tom sapusers 5 Mar 28 15:48 .
drwxr-xr-x 3 sj staff 3 Mar 28 15:48 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 tom sapusers 136 Mar 28 15:48 .cshrc
-rw-r--r-- 1 tom sapusers 157 Mar 28 15:48 .login
-rw-r--r-- 1 tom sapusers 174 Mar 28 15:48 .profile
% cat /etc/passwd
tom:x:101:1002::/home/tom:/bin/sh
% ls -al /home/tom
/home/tom: No such file or directory
% uname -a
SunOS sun03 5.10 Generic_127112-07 i86pc i386 i86pc
Exactly the same thing happens when I use the SMC2.1 GUI - even though it echoes back to me that the directory path qill /appuser/inputs before I hit 'finish', the directory is created correctly, but /home/tom goes into /etc/passwd.
Is there any fix/workaround for this, or am I back to an old-fashioned useradd in a setuid script?
Thanks
-- Steve

Father wrote:
that way, they are chrooted into an empty directory and have no files they can tamper with
isnt that a little dangerous??
What files a user can change is determined by the files' permission settings, not by the user's homedir. The homedir only tells what the initial working directory when a user logs in is, nothing else, it doesn't implicit writing or even reading access. So no, it's not dangerous, not even a little.

How do I delete home directory /Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash\Player ?

How do I delete<home directory>/Library/Preferences/Macromedia/Flash\Player?

Note that it'll be created over every time you load a Flash object in a Web browser (at least if it has Flash enabled).
The only way to consistently get rid of all its content would be to create an AppleScript, or use Automator to create a workflow that would empty this folder when you close the browser.

Help - "mail home directory full?

hi,
I have been using my Mail account for ages. This morning I openned mail but a message popped up saying "MAIL CANNOT UPDATE YOUR MAILBOXES BECAUSE YOUR HOME DIRECTORY IS FULL. You must free up space in your home folder before using Mail. Selete unneeded documnet or move documents to another volume. (Blue Quit Button).
We I searched the usual and went to Users/me/library/mail. I openned that and went to my POP account, openned up the mail boxes for inbox etc. I copied the .emlx messages into a folder and put them on the desktop, thinking that would free up some space. It didn't. I did a restart ... same message happens.... The mail bar opens but everything is grey, the message above pops up and I have no choice but to quit.
I can't access any of my mail. When I try to open one of the .emlx files on the desktop, the same message above opens. I am at a loss!
Could someone please help. I can't even get the About Mail to open so that I can tell you what I version I have, but I do update everything.
thanks

With the Mail.app quit and using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail.
Copy the Mail folder and place the copy on the Desktop for backup purposes.
Using the Finder, go to Home > Library > Mail > Envelope Index.
Delete the Envelope Index file and empty the Trash.
Launch Mail and you will be prompted to import all mailboxes available in the Mail folder at Home > Library > Mail. Select OK and allow the import process to complete.
This isn't really importing anything but replacing the deleted Envelope Index file and re-indexing all mailboxes and should resolve the problem.
After confirming all mailboxes and messages are available, you can delete the copy of the Mail folder placed on the Desktop.

My enitre home directory had disappeared!

Hello,
I wanted to free some space on my external hard disk. scince there is no easy way to do it in a mac (apple for god sake fix this) I moved some files in the external hard disk to the thrash then I emptied the tharsh. But to my surprise MY WHOLE home directory is GONE!!!!! everything inside it was DELETED, my photos, my projects, my music. WHAT SHOULD I DO HELP PLEASE!
thanks!

Your account of how you lost data frankly doesn't add up. I don't know what really happened, but it's not what you think.
Don't do any more work with the computer until you have a working backup solution. To have no backups more recent than a month ago is inexcusable. I suggest you use Time Machine with another external drive.
Once you've backed up, please launch the Disk Utility application, select your internal drive, and run "Verify Disk." If any errors are found, insert the installation DVD that came with the computer and boot from it by restarting and holding down the C key at the chime until the installer screen appears. DO NOT install. From the menu bar, select Utilities > Disk Utility. Again select the internal drive, and this time run "Repair Disk." Repeat until there are no more errors.

Ibook - loss home directory (deleted account)

Hi there,
Last week I bought this ibook g4 from someone;
I have problem i changed home directory name (little house icon) as this still had the previous owner's name, but also deleted this account. Can i still restore this; all my settings have gone as well and when logging in it appears 'empty'. Lost my mailaccounts; when trying to add them it says it does not have the login key chain anymore etc.
Hope you can help me out here !
natasja

Hi natasja
What you have done is quite a serious error.
Read this article and follow its prescriptions. I hope it can help you recover.
http://www.thexlab.com/faqs/renamehomerecovery.html
regards roam

`nobody' home directory is `/' ?!

i could be wrong about this, so feel free to tell me if i am..
the `nobody' user can be used to prevent unauthorised access in certain situations.
on other distros ive seen, the default home directory is something like
/usr/share/nobody
or
/usr/share/empty
that way, they are chrooted into an empty directory and have no files they can tamper with
on arch however, the nobody user has the following line (in /etc/passwd)
nobody:x:99:99:nobody:/:
its home directory is `/'
isnt that a little dangerous??

Father wrote:
that way, they are chrooted into an empty directory and have no files they can tamper with
isnt that a little dangerous??
What files a user can change is determined by the files' permission settings, not by the user's homedir. The homedir only tells what the initial working directory when a user logs in is, nothing else, it doesn't implicit writing or even reading access. So no, it's not dangerous, not even a little.

Home directory empty

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for