User accounts corrupted - how to fix

Question

So my Mac locked up the other day when the babysitter decided to put it to sleep. The fan was on full and it was unresponsive. I force-powered it off and then on again. When it came back, almost everything was fine except for my wife's account. It had switched to sort of my son's account. What I mean is that my son is running the restricted finder, and when my wife logged in, it was using the restricted finder and the "My Applications" folders, etc. were pointing to my son's directories. Everything else was normal, so when you select full finder, it's running from my wife's account (has her desktop files, etc.), but the dock was still the messed up one. Going into Accounts as me, it shows her as an admin and doesn't show that she is running the restricted finder.
I'm quite comfortable with Unix sys admin activities, but OS-X doesn't run things the same way as normal Unix systems. Can anybody help me figure out what's gotten messed up and how to fix?
Thanks.
Andrew

Answer 1

With a full or otherwise marginalized hard disk drive with possible damages
to files or directory (or corruption, lost data, or files lost due to meddling) the
advice to make a full backup of the computer's contents to an external HDD
in a suitable enclosure for use with your computer, is the best first step to
not loose any more data. Clone utilities help do this while retaining what is
left of the correct and original file structure which would be otherwise lost.
For other ideas about user accounts and their place in OS X systems, you
can take a look at how they work and how the topic is addressed in these
selected web page links. User accounts are the basis of keeping a system
secure and help keep the contents organized and protected. If someone
who has no business in an Admin account had this access, they could be
responsible for a considerable degree of damage. And the blame does not
necessarily fall on the last person to unknowingly mess it up. The owner
has to be accountable for learning how to best protect their investment and
the contents of the computer, and other users, from loss or harm.
There are several articles & documents to help manage accounts.
• Mac OS X: How to manage user access to applications, system ...
Aug 5, 2008 ... Mac OS X 10.2 reintroduced this level of Admin user control
over local users via the "Capabilities" function of the Accounts preference pane ...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2400
• Managing User Accounts - XvsXP.com, Mac OS X vs. Windows XP, OS X
has five main types of user accounts: Root; Administrator; Standard... acct
available under OS X. Root has absolute power and control over the system
Fewer types of user accounts limit access options. No easy way to limit ...
http://www.xvsxp.com/system/users_configuring.php
• Mac OS X 10.5: Working with user accounts and Accounts preferences
Dec 8, 2008 ... You can use Accounts preferences to configure or delete user
accounts in Mac OS X. Each account can have its own log in, password, ...
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT3309
• Mac OS X: Changing or resetting an account password
Learn how to change or reset an account password in Mac OS X, including the
original administrator account password... From the Apple menu choose System
Preferences. Select the user name of your original administrator account.
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1274
• Mac OS X 10.5 Help: Creating a new user account
You should create individual user accounts for each person who regularly...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.5/en/8235.html
• Mac OS X 10.5 Help: Creating a guest user account
When the log in window is appears the user can just click Guest Account...
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?path=Mac/10.5/en/15600.html
• Mac 101 - File Sharing:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1549
These links cover OS X in general, and the newer more common later ones.
Some of the ideas and processes can be applied, and knowing how the
basics work, should help in looking for more applicable information for 10.3.9.
To take charge of security and account management when more than one
person uses a computer (or even just one admin-owner account user) is a
preventative action. The later OS X systems are even more elaborately made
and there are some very in-depth articles and documents for management of
system accounts, user access, security and so on, for Leopard. These are
often pro-level documents and some of them are 3MB downloads.
In the meantime, damage control requires a different path be taken to recover
from the problems at hand; while looking into how to prevent them.
{Do you have a backup computer?}
Good luck & happy computing!