User accounts missing after system crash

I have an iMac running Lepoard
It reset itself possibly it got too hot.
After it had reset all of the user accounts seem to have disappeared.
The system goes through startup and presents a Logon dialog. The only user that shows up is a user called Other. This is not a valid user in the system.
The other piece of diagnostic information is that all keyboard keys during startup are ignored. Have tried getting to a CD boot, single user etc, nothing seems to be acknowledged.
Any thoughts as to what has happened or how to repair.

If you are able to I suggest you try a different keyboard for using the key commands at startup.
I would suggest a good third party repair utility like DiskWarrior or Drive Genius may be your best bet. If you are able to get a keyboard working with the Mac and you have the option then use target disk mode to mount your Mac on the Desktop of another Mac and back it up or if you have a bootable external HD then use that to boot the Mac up and again back up your data. Hardware can be replaced or repaired and applications can be reinstalled but data cannot unless you have a backup so make sure your data is safe first before you tinker too much.

Similar Messages

User account missing after upgrade to Yosemite?

I have a mid-2010 iMac which up until recently I had two user accounts on for general use and one for music (Garageband, Logic and audio files etc). After upgrading to Yosemite, this separate user has vanished. I'm left with my original admin account, and a guest login. If I search for any of the files using spotlight, they do show up, but if I try to open them I get the message "you do not have permission to open this document". Also I had folders on the desktop of the music account which contained files, these folders show up in a search but are listed as empty? The files themselves are 'blank white sheet' icons as if they have no application.
I would assume this is a lost cause if not for the fact that my hard drive (more than half of which was taken up by the 'music' user) still reads as pretty much full up. So have I wiped all this forever?
Thanks in advance,
Dave

retina MacBookPro mid2012. Clean install of OS X Yosemite 10.10
I'm randomly missing an account at login screen after reboot.
Sometimes I can fix it with booting into my initial account 'Kevin' (userid 501) and then changing to different login 'Christina' (userid 502).
But if I log out from my account, the second account is missing. Same if I do a reboot.. This have me in stitches as I ofcause has the need for privacy from each account.
Both accounts are set up as admins, guest is deactivated.
rMBP 16gb sep2012.
userid 501:
home directory: /Users/Kevin
userid 502:
home directory: /Users/Christina
apart from that... I have loads of problems with Bluetooth, and hand-off only working 1 way (5s with 8.1) where only iOS -> OS X works, not vice-versa.

Old user accounts missing after repair

I just had the "random shutdown disorder" fixed on my MacBook at my local Apple Store. When the MacBook came back, and I powered it up, I had to go through the whole "new computer start up" stuff again. When I was done, I was surprised to see a desktop that was NOT the desktop that I expected. The desktop was empty, and the dock was not my old dock.
The Applications folder quickly confirmed that all of my old software was there. And then a look at the MacBook/users folder showed that all of my old accounts were still there (along with the stuff that I had had on my desktop, documents, etc.).
How do I get my OLD main user account back to being the default? I will assume that once that has happened, the other accounts will also be available (since none of them appear now in the account list).
Thanks.
Gary
MacBook Mac OS X (10.4.8) 2GHz Intel; 1.25 GB 667 MHz DDR2
MacBook Mac OS X (10.4.6)

I cannot list any accounts -- none appear other than the new one I created. They only exist in the "Users" folder.
The Users folder contains the account home folders, not the accounts themselves; to create the accounts, open the Accounts pane of System Preferences and create new ones in the same order they were originally created.
That said, I've never figured out HOW the computer decides what to call the "admin" account -- it has been called "admin" on one of my computers, "Home" on another (actually, the computer in question before this repair), and now "grbrower".
If an account is a member of the admin group, it will have administrator access to the machine regardless of what its shortname is; you can view the membership of this group in the NetInfo Manager, which is in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder. It is possible for no administrator accounts to be present on the machine; this can happen if you change the shortname of the only administrator account on the machine through the NetInfo Manager without updating the admin group's membership.
(17299)

User accounts missing after post install reboot and cannot login

The 10.5 install process completed and my mac mini rebooted and came up with the login screen. None of my user accounts show - my admin user and my regular user account (also has admin privs) are not available and all I can chose is 'Other' - I have enter both my user accounts and passwords but they are not accepted.
I then restarted from the Leopard disk, cancelled the install program and used the password utility to reset these passwords and all the accounts show up in the selections (including a guest one I have set up).
I'm stuck here - can get no further. Only option seems to be restarting the install from scratch unless anyone else has a good suggestion?

Ok now restarted the install process (by selecting back from the login screen and then selecting restart from the login screen that showed the 'Other' user account only. I held down the c on the keyboard until the restart took the Leopard disc which was in the drive.
Then I went thru the install steps (language, license agree etc) and when it asked for what disk to install on I selected the mac mini HDD ad then clicked the options button to select the Archiv and Install option (rather than the Update only option I had been doing).
The install process purred through ok and I am up and running.
Now on to my MacBook Pro .....Thanks for the help and suggestions all

Please help: fail to recover after system crash

Hi all,
I tried to start our directory server after system crash due to hardware failure. Error log shows:
[17/Apr/2010:01:35:15 +0800] - WARNING<20488> - Backend Database - conn=-1 op=-1 msgId=-1 - Detected Disorderly Shutdown last time Directory Server was running, recovering database.
However, the recover process seems never ends (I waited overnight...). While CPU usage of ns-slapd grows continuously, the server has no response (e.g. ldapsearch waits forever). I make copies of db before starting ns-slapd and thus I tried several attempts:
1. start as it is.
2. remove db/log* and start
3. remove db/log* and db/__db* and start
4. remove db/* except db/NetscapeRoot and start
All attempts have the same result - recovery goes on continuously.
Then I tried to remove db/* and run restoreconfig with an old configuration backup. Then ns-slapd can be started. However, when I do ldapsearch testing:
ldapsearch -h localhost -v -D"cn=directory manager" -b "" -s base objectclass= namingContexts
ldap_init( localhost, 389 )
Bind Password:
ldap_simple_bind_s: Invalid credentials
I'm sure the password is correct, and also tried modifying nsslapd-rootpw in config/dse.ldif and corresponding userPassword in configuration file created by saveconfig before restoreconfig.
Again, all attempts have the same result - invalid credentials. I can see BIND cn=directory manager attempts in logs/access, but also see following line in logs/errors:
[17/Apr/2010:21:59:08 +0800] - INFORMATION - conn=-1 op=-1 msgId=-1 - get_entry: entry cn=directory manager not found (error 32)
I'd like to know:
* if there any other method to make recovery process complete successfully?
* if there is anything missed/wrong in the restoreconfig process?
I tried several days but can't make it. Would anyone please help?
Sorry that we're still using old versions 5.2 patch 5 on Solaris 5.9 on v440 machines...
Thank you very much.
/ST Wong ([email protected])

I hope you have a export of LDAP data backup in LDIF format, if so, please stop the instance and remove all the files from your db directory which includes .db3 and log.* and __db* and then do a ldif2db.
Once import is complete, start the slapd process.

Data Buffer error USER_AUTH_FAILED: User account for logonid "SYSTEM"

All, I have the following errors on both the Quality and the Production system in our data buffer job.
com.sap.security.api.NoSuchUserException: USER_AUTH_FAILED: User account for logonid "SYSTEM" not found!
These entries will not process because they are generating an error about the loginid for the Username SYSTEM is not found.
So I am thinking that somehow the MII system is not capturing the correct username when they are being added into the Data Buffer Jobs, or there is something I am overlooking when I set up the databuffering.
Other entries that were in the data buffer jobs were listed as using the RS1000SVC-QMUSBATCH, RS1630SVC-PMIIBATCH User accounts. These are the accounts that our scheduled tasks run under.
Those entries process OK out of the data buffer jobs.
I did notice a similarity between the data buffer jobs in the quality and production systems as it pertains to the following transactions.
Production MII ver 12.0.7 (Build 20)
Muscatine%2FIntegration%2FSAP%2FPROD_CONFIRMED_INPUT_InsertQuery
Which is called from the MIIC1043_IDOC Message Processing Rule.
Muscatine%2FIntegration%2FSAP%2FHEADER_InsertQuery
Which is called from the MIIC1043_Control_Recipe_Download Message Processing Rule.
Quality MII 12.0.11 (Build 14)
Muscatine%2FIntegration%2FSAP%2FPROD_CONFIRMED_INPUT_InsertQuery
Which is called from the MIIC1043_IDOC Message Processing Rule.
So the commonality is that these transactions are being initaiated by the Message processing rules.
Are there known issues with data buffering from transactions initiated with Message Processing Rules?
Is anyone sucessfully using data buffering of transactions called by message processing rules?
Any help is appreciated.
Bob

Jeremy, Thanks for your reply.
There doesn't seem to be much detailed information on the use of Catagories with Processing rules in Help or in the forums. So let me see if I understand your suggestion correctly.
On the MII server create a processing rule for the message using a category instead of using a transaction, The message received by the message listener will be placed in a buffer. I am assuming these messages whould show up in the message monitor and not in the Data Buffer jobs/entries.
So in my transaction which normally processes this data I could add logic to access the message data; using the Message Service (Query, Read, Update and Delete) action blocks. I could pare down the selection by selecting messages based on the MessageCategory that I defined in the message processing rule. This will allow me to access the stored message data.
Finally use a scheduled Job to execute the transaction. The scheduled job would be run with a valid userID and Password so if it connection to the external database failed the enteries would be placed in the data buffer jobs with a valid userID credentials.
Does this sound like what you had in mind?

Workflow continue after system crash.

Dear Workflow expert,
I have customized the standard leave request workflow to a 2 level approval workflow. However, sometimes the workflow will suddenly stop without any error and I need to go to tcode SWPC (execute workflow after system crash) to continue the workflow.
Anyone can tell me in what circumstances that the workflow will fall into this category, because it like happens quite frequently.
Thanks
Regards,
Bryan

Hmm, searching to difficult?
[This|Workflow hanging - ST22 and SWU2 empty; is the thread.
Regards,
Martin

User account disappeared after an OS 10.4.11 update crash!

I think the power went out during a mac update. When I started the computer again, I saw a very old desktop and all my files are missing! Everything has reverted to an older user account? The name of my user account was apple#1, but now it just says apple and does not contain any of my files created in the last year. Maybe since I upgraded to Tiger, not sure.
Is there a way to find my missing user account or my old files! I tried some of the data recovery programs but they are very difficult to use and dont show file names.
Any help would be appreciated,
Thanks,
Dan

Dan
I responded to your other message suggesting you open a new Topic, not realising you already had one
And then I went away for a few days, so sorry if you felt ignored
Did you try the commands I suggested in the other Topic?

WLC loses user account database after reload

The certificate on the Wireless Lan controller had expired.
I installed the certificate and restarted the controller.
The controller lost the entire user account database.
I imported the database from another system and after the reload the database was again lost.
Apart from this everything else works fine.
And there are also problems when restoring guest user accounts from Wireless Controll System, WCS the accounts are restored but not the passwords. Also we cannot set expiration date longer then 30 days, we have to set it unlimited first and then change it to limited.
Please let me know if anyone has come across this kind of an issue.

Hi,
I had a similar problem just a day ago:
A WLC4402-50 crashed and lost all of its database entries (Usernames, PSKs, MAC-Adresses,...). I don't know if it restarted and then crashed, or if it crashed and then restarted because of the crash.
The crash log contains this lines:
"Analysis of Failure:
Software was stopped for the following reason:
The system has encountered a fatal condition at mmc_system.c:2093"
Very strange behaviour. I would appreciate any comment, if i have to exchange the hardware or if i shouldn't take any action.
Regards,
Sebastian

User account missing files and preferences?? Not from renaming home folder

Hi all,
After some strange behaviour in Apple Color, upon rebooting, my user account has returned to default. I had many items on the desktop and various subfolders in the documents folder. All pictures. Music. All are now gone. Desktop and dock have been reset to default.
The user folder still exists but everything I had in there is gone.
Another user may have been created called "root" containing only
/Library
/Documents/Color Documents...etc
I am aware of the problem with changing the short name or renaming the home folder (after sifting through this forum) and it is definitely not this problem.
Maybe its somehow related but I definitely did not rename any of these things myself. And there is no duplicated user account with all my files in it.
Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers
Nate
ps. Is it possible to restore the system to an earlier time like in Windows?
I've read somewhere that a Previous System folder exists and it might be possible with Disk Utility but I can't find this folder anywhere.
Message was edited by: stoney23

Hi there,
Thanks for the reply. I've managed to restore most of my important stuff using a file recovery software so I'm at peace with the loss of only a few files now. I'll just have to start rebuilding my dock and preferences again now which is not the end of the world.
After a bit of thinking about it I'm 95% sure this is what happened.
Color tried to save an image file with the same name as the folder I had made storing all my Color project saves. The folder was called Post. I'm not quite sure how its possible but it managed to overwrite the folder with the new image file. Now there is a Color image file (with no extension) there called Post and no folder.
Then I tried to save the Color project and of course it told me the project directory was missing and it will create a new one. I'm guessing this is when Color bulldozed through my user account to create the folder Color Documents where it DIDN'T save the file anyway
Leaving me with a default user account deleting everything that was 'added' to the account previously.
It also created another user account called 'root' in which there is also only a Color Library/preferences and documents folder
Is that normal that things like that can just happen?
I guess from here I will just try and finish my project and afterwards do a re-install of the OS just to be sure - checking the Archive and Install option this time
Unless you have any other ideas from what I've told you.
Thanks again for replying
Nate

Account missing after Pacifist installation

My Apache software on my mac had some issues. So I used a software, Pacifist, to reinstall some parts (Contents Of EssentialSystemSoftware Group folder) from the OS X installation CD. Pacifist crashed during this installation, and I had to restart my computer.
When I booted on Macintosh HD, my account (which I used to click on to type my password) was missing. What showed up was the login page where I could fill in Name: & Password:. But my account name and the password didn't work.
So, I thought that maybe some system software where damaged when I used Pacifist, so I reinstalled the OS X software and choose the option where I could keep my existing documents etc.
No success. Now I can just log in with the root account (changed password with password utility with OSX installation cd) BUT I know that my files are still on my hard drive because I just have 2gb left (which I had before my problem).
How can I reach my existing documents?
Message was edited by: Saffari

Yes, actually I found my files on Macintosh HD/Users/saffari. Woho! That was a relief. But still im logged in as 'root'. The name on Finder is 'root' and all my preset computer features are reset.
If i check in the Accounts in the system preferences there are just one account visable, named System administrator whit the 'short name' root.
Now when I've found my files, I've deleted some data and have approximately 9 gb free space.

? How to recover APPS from iTunes after system crash

I think we need a sticky for this.
Is there a tutorial or instructions to recover ALL your iPhone/iPod Touch apps from your PC or iTunes after a system crash and iTunes is no longer accessible even after uninstall and reinstallation? I heard one can call Apple Support and have them do a one time reset but for people like me who have more than one iTunes account that may be a problem since it would require several accounts.

Ok....i have some good news, I believe. Using King_Penguin's link and Apple's KB seems to have worked. I tried this under another windows profile on the same machine. The TRICK is to hold down CTRL W when opening up iTunes. This will prompt you to tell iTunes where the library is. The key is to copy everything from your My MUSIC\ITUNES folder. More info here: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1751
What is throwing me off is there is another option to, "Create LIBRARY". Not sure how that works. But the instructions are here: When you need to restore your backed up iTunes Library from your external hard drive to your computer, follow these steps:
1.Quit iTunes.
2.Locate your external hard drive.
Mac: On the Desktop or Finder sidebar.
Windows: In My Computer
3.Drag the iTunes folder (backed up earlier) from your external hard drive to whatever location you desire on your internal hard drive. It is recommended that you choose the default location for the iTunes folder, which is:
Mac OS X: /Users/username/Music
Windows XP: \Documents and Settings\username\My Documents\My Music\
Windows Vista or Windows 7: \Users\username\My Music\

Lost User Account Settings After OSX Security Update

After loading the security update, the system booted up into OSX and into my account without asking for a password. Other than having the same dock icons and applications, my account seems to have been cleared. I have no files on my desktop and all my programs are reset, each one asking me to set it up, find registration and serial numbers, etc. The dock was at its default position on the bottom also.
I found my user account and the settings for it under Shared users on my MacIntosh HD. I don't know how it got there, but all my information is there...I just don't know hot to get OSX to use it instead of the bare bones settings it seems to have chosen.
Can anyone help me with this? I am still running OSX 10.3.9 on a Mac G4.
Mac G4 MDD Mac OS X (10.3.9)

The system would not allow me to do this because some files were in use in the account into which I was trying to copy. I had already been looking in the accounts prior to having a response and decided to do the following:
1) create a new account with a different name - I used "owner"
2) copy all the information from the old account which I found under shared into the new "owner" account
3) log out of the account I was on (the labotomized version of my original account) and log on to new "owner" account. Verify links, files, etc...everything was good, just like it had been.
4) rename the offending account.
5) rename new owner account back to the old name.
6) log out and back in the old account name...everything was back with my original account name.
Might not have needed all those steps, but I can't believe that worked. I was quite happy it worked, but still confused at to how that happened in the first place.

User accounts gone after Restoring disk

Hello -
I am running OS 10.4.11 on a PowerMac G4 Dual 450MHz Desktop. Recently I purchased a new IDE Hard Drive to put into my computer. I wanted to make an exact copy of my old hard drive onto the new hard drive and use the new hard drive as my main startup volume. I used the Restore tab in Disk Utility to create the copy.
What happened is that none of the user account data was copied over. Even more strange is that now I cannot find any of my user account data on the original hard drive!
I used the application "Whatsize" to figure out where all the data is allocated to on the original hard drive. It only accounted for about 25GB of the 30GB of data that are being used on the hard drive. I'm guessing the remaining 5GB of data is what was in my user account, but it can't find it for some reason.
Anyhow, I guess my question is, how do I recover the data from my user account that I can't seem to find?
Also, steps I've taken so far:
- I ran Disk Utility (from another computer using the disk in Target disk mode) to see if I could repair permissions or repair the disk. Neither Repair Permissions nor Verify Permissions were enabled for me to check - only Verify and Repair Disk. I clicked Verify Disk and got a message saying that it had failed and said that "The underlying task reported failure on exit". I then tried to Repair Disk, but got the same error. Disk cannot be verified or repaired.
- I've also tried DiskWarrior on it, but it doesn't seem to do anything.
Thanks,
Steve Pederson

Hi Steve,
I found the following in the Apple Help Viewer. Read thoroughly first to see if this might help you:
Restoring a deleted user account
If a user's account was deleted and the contents of the user's home folder were saved, you can restore that user's account and the contents of their home folder. Saved items in the deleted home folder are stored in a disk image file (the filename ends in .dmg) in the Deleted Users folder in the Users folder on the startup disk.
1. To open the user's deleted files, double-click the disk image in the Deleted Users folder in the Users folder on the startup disk. The disk image content appears in a new window.
2. Note: If there is no disk image for the user's deleted account, no files were saved when the account was deleted. You will need to create a new account for the user.
3. To restore the deleted user's home folder, open the Users folder on the startup disk and choose File > New Folder.
4. Type a name for the folder and then press Return.
5. To copy the contents of the disk image to the new user account, in the disk image file, choose Edit > Select All and then drag the contents to the user folder you created.
6. To re-create the deleted user account, choose Apple menu > System Preferences and click Accounts. If some settings are dimmed, click the lock icon and type an administrator name and password.
7. Click Add + and then type the user name. If you don't want to use the automatically generated short name, type a new short name. (After the account is created, you won't be able to change the short name.)
8. Type the user's password in the Password and Verify boxes. You may type a hint to help the user remember the password.
9. Click Create Account.
10. In the dialog that appears, click OK restore the user's account. The user's home folder will contain all their saved files.
Carolyn
Message was edited by: Carolyn Samit

I need a logout script that will erase the standard user account data after logout.

I have a lab of 35 Macbook Pros and I am trying to make it where when the user logouts, it will erase the data after they logout.
I have found several articles about deleting user accounts when they login through AD, but this is not the case.
Any help would be much help!

Then when they are at those system they do not Login and if they do have to enter a password it is whatever it is for the Base user account that is setup. Right?
I'd look at the Mac KB system to see if you can restrict saving to the local HDD but yet allow saving to a thumb drive or not.
To do what you want the system would need to keep track of all files saved from time X to time Y, and those times would be every changing. Not sure you are going to get there from here.
Not sure what you mean by Lab machines. I've worked in and gone to school at a Graphic art school and they have hundreds of Lab Mac's that each student must log into with there own user account when in different classes and when saving any of there work it gets saved on the server so it can be retrieved by them when they log into another system someplace else throughout the school or when using their own computer and connected to the schools network.
I wish you the best of luck with this project.

User accounts missing after system crash

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for