'Ignore ownership on this volume' not sticking?

[Weaselboy]

You wondered correctly.

Installed 10.9 on a partition on the internal HDD. Then proceeded to reformat each of another internal HDD partition; a USB external partition; and a flash drive.

'Ignore ownership' defaults were:
internal – UNCHECKED
external – CHECKED
flash – CHECKED

The above is 'correct', yes? It makes sense for removables to default to permissionlessness.

This is exactly the behavior I see on 10.9.2 and from what I read around different sites, should be the default.

Then used Migration Assistant to bring over 'computer settings' only. I believe this was <200KB in size. From the values in volinfo.database I could see that this was one of the migrated files, but I think that's besides the point. Reformatted the three volumes again, and:
internal – UNCHECKED
external – UNCHECKED
flash – CHECKED

So there you have it. Something that's migrated in 'computer settings' is changing the default 'ignore ownership' setting for a newly erased USB HDD drive.

So like you suspected, volinfo.database does come over as part of Migration Assistant. If you delete volinfo.database after this migration do all externals default back to checked? Odd.

 

[mojolicious]

If you delete volinfo.database after this migration do all externals default back to checked? Odd.

On my dodgy installation: if I delete volinfo.database then every partition mounted at that time defaults to ...001/UNCHECKED, including flash drives.

Bit of a detour: if I format a flash drive and install two partitions...
a) on format they both have 'ignore ownership' checked
b) they both have permissions of me-rw, staff-rw, everyone-ro
c) as stated above, on deletion of volinfo.database they both shift to unchecked
d) the first partition retains the same permissions as before
e) the second partition changes to system-rw, wheel-rw, everyone-ro

Curious.

Haven't tried it on a virgin Mavericks partition – don't currently have a virgin Mavericks partition – but I'd be interested to know if this particular behaviour is normal.

 

[Weaselboy]

On my dodgy installation: if I delete volinfo.database then every partition mounted at that time defaults to ...001/UNCHECKED, including flash drives.

Bit of a detour: if I format a flash drive and install two partitions...
a) on format they both have 'ignore ownership' checked
b) they both have permissions of me-rw, staff-rw, everyone-ro
c) as stated above, on deletion of volinfo.database they both shift to unchecked
d) the first partition retains the same permissions as before
e) the second partition changes to system-rw, wheel-rw, everyone-ro

Curious.

Haven't tried it on a virgin Mavericks partition – don't currently have a virgin Mavericks partition – but I'd be interested to know if this particular behaviour is normal.

That was not a scenario I had tested. Just tried it out and it does behave differently when I delete volinfo.database depending on if the volume is mounted or not. I am seeing the same sequence you are.

If I delete volinfo.database and the external is mounted if defaults to UNchecked.

If I delete volinfo.database and the external is not mounted, then I remount, it defaults to checked.

So it looks like we are seeing the same things now and maybe your earlier oddities were because volumes were mounted while others were not when you deleted volinfo.database?

So looks like the ideal case would be unmount everything but the OS volume then delete volinfo.database I suppose.

 

[mojolicious]

So it looks like we are seeing the same things now and maybe your earlier oddities were because volumes were mounted while others were not when you deleted volinfo.database?

Sorry, I left this alone for a couple of days then lost my will to live enthusiasm to install yet another clean system. And then my shiny new (kinda) MacBook arrived to distract me. Thought I'd better reply here before I sort out my 10.6.8 partition for Civ III

I'm assuming that the 'uncheck all volumes on deletion of volinfo.database is regular behaviour. That's certainly what I'm seeing whether I'm using my diseased install or a fresh install. Remember I said that my 'original' volinfo.database had a creation date of 6 Feb 2014: I've got no idea what would have forced that to happen and I've established that the only possible candidate for a forced recreation, Onyx, does *not* delete the file.

My migrated system appears to differ from the norm in one regard only: Disk Utility creates internal partitions which are UNCHECKED. It's still too early to say whether or not internal partitions which have been checked will continue to randomly revert to unchecked. It's also a major presumption to think that the two behaviours are linked.

So the problem seems to lie with some process that's invoked once DU has finished its work, a partition is mounted for the first time, and the ownerships are first written.

I'm curious to know what the problem is, but it's not a biggie. And as I said, I still don't know if the 'random unchecking' problem has migrated. I'm assuming I could fix the post-DU default permissions of internal partitions by going through the whole Mavericks + Migration Assistant process again, but to be honest I'm more inclined to live with it.

Especially as I've just found my Civ 3 disk image...

 

[MacShopper]

I'm reviving an old thread.
No reason, I just stumbled onto it while searching for something.

Just my opinion, but it seems every time I see someone try and keep the users/home folder on a separate volume from the OS they have no end of problems. I would not do it. I would keep the home folder on the SSD along with the OS and apps, then just put your big data folders (like maybe Music and Photos etc) on the HDD if you need to.

My Home folder is on the boot partition, but I've been been keeping very large folders on another partition since receiving my new computer several months ago.

I partitioned my internal drive into 3 volumes:
200 GB Startup, 30 GB Repair, and 770 GB Data.
Startup and Repair also have Recovery partitions (required to use FileVault).

My Software folder and 160 GB+ iTunes library reside on the Data partition.
I did this in the hope that having a small boot partition would speed things up, but have no way to tell if it's really helping. Plus it should lessen the chance of data corruption in my iTunes library.

The only thing that's caused issues is that I recently began using FileVault, and also encrypted the Data partition. So every time I boot, I must unlock the Data partition to have access to those folders, and also unlock the Repair partition if I need to access it.

It's not a problem, just an extra step.

 

[meeshieck]

hi guys,

i too have a problem with ignore ownership not sticking.

the thing is that in my studio i use a bunch of thunderbolt drives hooked up to my computer that i share with other macs in the studio.

every time i restart my computer that thing gets unchecked and i need to manually do it again and everything works until the next shut down or restart, otherwise nobody can touch those volumes.

not much of an issue, just really, really annoying.

can anyone tell me how to fix that?

thanks!

 

[Bob-K]

There is a file called volinfo.database at /var/db that stores this information for each volume and the file can get corrupted. Try running the command below in Terminal (you will be asked for your password) to delete the file, then reboot your system and reset "ignore ownership" however you want on each volume.

Make sure you have a good backup before you do this.

If you are curious you can open Finder then Go menu then Go to folder and paste in /var/db and enter then scroll down to volinfo.database and open it with Textedit. You will see a string that IDs each volume followed by 00000001 if ownership is on or 00000000 if it is off. Just command-q quit out of Textedit when done.

sudo rm /var/db/volinfo.database

Thanks for this, Weaselboy!

It resolved a similar problem I was having on an internal drive in my Mac Pro (used for data storage, not a System drive). After restart, "ignore ownership on this drive" would become un-checked, and that was causing some issues with music production app Digital Performer (v9.13).

After following your procedure, "ignore ownership" is now sticking.

Thanks again!

Bob

 

[Aetles]

I still have this issue, using macOS 10.13.4. Ejecting all disks and deleting /var/db/volinfo.database does not help, the setting is forgotten the next day or so.

Edit: Oh, it's probably SuperDuper doing this, since I backup this disk every night.

 

[seitsme]

hello, i write to this post because i want to ask 2 things regarding the ownership issue etc. while trying to find out how to fix Error code -43.

I have 1TB external usb hdd. i was using it with Leopard and move to Lion if i remember correctly on my old PPC DC which was replaced by a macintel tower DC 2ghz machine sold a while ago.

I cannot remember if Lion was the latest OSX on that last machine... Then while trying to fix a damaged file, and moving content on a PC with win 7 on it, i came accross the innapropriate file names and other problems with Win and macs long or very long filenames which i have had on that HDD.

At the end, this hdd, is still alive and i use it under OSX 10.13.6 (latest) on a mbc late 2009.
Today i got my new 3TB external hdd and tried to copy or move files from the 1TB external as well.
I get error -43 when i move between 3 and 1TB hdds or even copy...
When i move or copy from the 1TB to my High sierra HFS+ journalled hdd it works after i enter admin password.

I run a permissions reset app on the hdd and reset permissions etc. still issue the same.
Then i read a bit on this post and not sure if all instructions apply for me as well...
I tried insofar a Get info on the 1TB hdd and then set System and Wheel R&W and for everyone Read only.
then i saw the ignore ownership checkbox and not sure what exactly that is doing.

Should I repeat the above permissions with checked the ignore ownership box or uncheck it and proceed.
What goes wrong with the hdd. Disk utility shows no problems at all.