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Mac OS X Update 10.2.4 Resets

Oculus Habent writes "It may just be me, but 10.2.4 reset a number of settings on my computer, including icon sizes, window positions, and dock size and contents. Minor annoyances, but completely unnecessary. Is anyone else experiencing this?" As for me, Apple re-added some apps to my Dock and overwrote all my changes to httpd.conf (though it did back it up first) to add mod_rendezvous_apple. But those problems pale in comparison to some others: Anonymous Coward writes "If you upgraded your Mac desktop to 10.2.4 last weekend, check your date and time. Many users have suddenly found it to be 4:00 PM, December 31, 1969 again. Apparently, this happens whenever they are shut down or restarted, and resetting the motherboard and/or the PRAM doesn't fix it. Complaints have been piling up at Apple.com and prices for batteries have been skyrocketing - but relax. It's not your battery!"

15 of 135 comments (clear)

  1. Works for Me by yancey · · Score: 2, Informative


    I grabbed 10.2.4 as soon as it came out.. indeed, even before it was mentioned on Slashdot! I have not seen any of the problems mentioned.

    Though the httpd.conf file was probably replaced, I wouldn't have noticed since this is a laptop and I don't use Apache very often.

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  2. zero problems for me by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Everything worked fine for me. Nothing reset, no changes to the Dock. I don't know if it makes a difference but I downloaded the tar file directly and ran the update later, rather than using Software Update.

    Haven't seen any time/date changes, but my clock is set by NTP anyway.

    PS: One thing I like to do before any major update is run something like "find -s / > /tmp/filelist" to get a list of all files and dates. Then run it again after the update and diff the two lists. That will show you httpd.conf changed, for instance. Also it's just interesting to see what files change on the machine as I learn about the OS. You can also get lists of files from the archive itself or from the "bill of materials" file ("man lsbom") after installation.

    PPS: does anybody know what the file /iNode12022737 is for? I keep seeing files like that in the root dir...

    1. Re:zero problems for me by laptop006 · · Score: 2, Informative

      > PPS: does anybody know what the file /iNode12022737 is for? I keep seeing files like that in the root dir...

      That looks like an orphaned file, where there is still a file associated with an inode, but no file name associated with it.

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    2. Re:zero problems for me by Halo1 · · Score: 2, Informative
      You can simply do the following to see what files will be changed:

      lsbom MacOSX10.2.4.pkg/Contents/Archive.bom

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  3. It happened to me! by Visigothe · · Score: 3, Informative

    I thought it was rather odd as well. I had icons for iChat, the addressbook, and some other applications that weren't on the dock pre-update. My time wasn't affected to my recollection, but some of my other prefs were.

    Know what I did? I removed the icons, and fixed my prefs. Then I promptly forgot about the whole thing and got on with my life.

    I did find it strange though... That sort of thing has never happened to me before

  4. Re:Still haven't fixed... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

    Yeah I see that too. Though I don't think it has anything to do with the Finder-generated preview, because I see it on other icons too occasionally. It doesn't do it all the time.

    I also see an occasional problem when I have "FILE.jpg" and "FILE.psd" files in the same folder, i.e., the file from my camera and it's edited version. I keep the folders in Icon view with 128x128 icons. Whenever I save the .psd from within photoshop, the same icon appears on both files! sometimes it appears on other adjacent files too, or sometimes the icons just disappear (but it still works to click in the empty space).

    Drives me nuts, this does!

  5. Protecting your OS from changes by kruetz · · Score: 3, Informative

    I'm guessing the installer/updater plays along with the *NIX user system, right? So what about "chmod a-w httpd.conf" for protecting your httpd settings? If you don't want your settings modified by Apple, use the power of *NIX against it!

    Or does this not work?

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    1. Re:Protecting your OS from changes by Visigothe · · Score: 4, Informative
      I'm guessing the installer/updater plays along with the *NIX user system, right? So what about "chmod a-w httpd.conf" for protecting your httpd settings? If you don't want your settings modified by Apple, use the power of *NIX against it!

      That won't work, as in order to update the system, you must supply the admin password. The admin [root, but not exactly] can do anything.

    2. Re:Protecting your OS from changes by jim3e8 · · Score: 3, Informative

      Root can do anything; the permissions are advisory only, and can be ignored. Otherwise, that mode 000 file would become a permanently inaccessible paperweight.

  6. Re:sudo doesn't require NetInfo hacking by punkmanandy · · Score: 2, Informative

    sudo tcsh works better for most people, and sudo -s is the best, as it keeps your evironment variables the same, but you get a root shell.

  7. My 12 computers by mj_1903 · · Score: 2, Informative

    My 12 computers (mine and Apple store) have had no problems with the update.

  8. There ARE problems with this update by Nexum · · Score: 3, Informative

    Hi all,

    Firstly I have to say unfortunately there are inherent problems with this update, and the one about the clock resetting to Jan 1 1970 (plus or minus a few hours depending on your time zone) is absolutely true as I am experiencing it myself.

    It does however only seem to be affecting fual processor G4's though, so that may explain the mixed reaction.

    If you are still in doubt, check Apple's discussion board here where there are a total of 66 replies to my original post complaining of the clock issue (hopefully link will work, if not, check out the OSX area under discussions on Apple.com).

    It seems that a large number of people are having this trouble, and although there is no way I would ever switch to another platform after using OSX, it is disappointing that Apple allows these things through the net.

    Although OSX is vastly superior to Windows XP, I simply can't imagine MS distributing an update for Windows that would have this fundamental effect. I think that Apple should make sure they concentrate also on the mundane routine stuff in checking as well as the super-cool revolutionary stuff they are so uniquely good at (Rendezvous, Bluetooth integration, iApps etc etc).

    Here's waiting for a fix VERY soon.

    -Nex

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  9. Re:why does everyone jump all over upgrades? by adashiel · · Score: 2, Informative

    I agree in principle, but among the bugfixes in the 10.2.4 update were several security-related items. From http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=617 98 (Comments in brackets mine)

    Mac OS X 10.2.4

    • Sendmail: Fixes CAN-2002-0906 Buffer overflow in Sendmail before 8.12.5, when configured to use a custom DNS map to query TXT records, could permit a denial of service attack and possibly allow execution of arbitrary code. Mac OS X 10.2.4 contains Sendmail 8.12.6 with the SMRSH fix applied to also address CAN-2002-1165. [Not an issue for most, obviously, but, well, it's sendmail.]

    • AFP: Fixes CAN-2003-0049 "AFP login permissions for the system administrator". Provides an option whereby a system administrator may or may not be allowed to log in as a user, authenticating via their admin password. Previously, administrators could always log in as a user, authenticating via their own admin password. [I haven't seen any documentation on setting this up yet. Hrm. Hrm.]

    • Classic: Fixes CAN-2003-0088, where an attacker may change an environment variable to create arbitrary files or overwrite existing files, which could lead to obtaining elevated privileges. Credit to Dave G. from @stake, Inc. for discovering this issue. [This one can be pretty serious if you're running the classic environment in a lab setting. <insert standard physical security disclaimer here>]

    • Samba: Previous releases of Mac OS X are not vulnerable to CAN-2002-1318, an issue in Samba's length checking for encrypted password changes. Mac OS X currently uses Directory Services for authentication, and does not call the vulnerable Samba function. However, to prevent a potential future exploit via this function, the patch from Samba 2.2.7 was applied although the version of Samba was not changed for this update release. Further information is available from: http://samba.org/samba/whatsnew/samba-2.2.7.html [This may not have been an real issue for OS X, but it was a pain for me nevertheless. Every time our internal security scanner checked my systems, it would squawk about a high-priority security alert. That never fails to attract the attention of managers.]

    Note: To my knowledge, none of these security fixes were released prior to 10.2.4. You could fix some of them yourself, but for the general Mac audience, that's a wildly unrealistic expectation.

    ObOnTopic: I experienced the clock reset on my dualie, but NTP fixed that easily enough. In previous releases, I've had Dock items added and experienced other minor annoyances. It's never been consistent across machines, though, and since the problems were so trivial I never bothered to troubleshoot them further. Permissions issues? Files out of place? Gremlins?

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  10. Other thread lists issues too. by tuxedobob · · Score: 2, Informative

    Those looking for answers here may also want to visit the other thread on this subject.

  11. my dual processor g4 by commodoresloat · · Score: 2, Informative

    did not experience this problem. I did repair permissions right after the update but I didn't notice this problem at all.