macOS forgot admin password and lost administrator access

macOS forgot admin password and lost administrator access

macOS lost administrator access, forgot admin password ?

There is a way to bypass this!

  1. Make sure that FileVault is not enabled.
    If you don’t know, then check it by opening:
    System Preferences > Security & Privacy > FileVault.
    If it says “FileVault is turned on for the disk …” then you won’t be able to fix it and you might as well stop reading this article.
  2. Make sure you have a reliable backup in the event something unexpected occurs. To learn how to use Time Machine please read Use Time Machine to back up or restore your Mac – Apple Support.

Confirm both of those before proceeding.

Then: Read and follow the instructions below with care.

As I understand it, you have a Mac with no Administrator accounts. Of course that is not supposed to be possible, but if that really is the case you can use the following technique to create a new, temporary Administrator account, the sole purpose of which will be to log in as an Administrator that can give your normal account Admin privileges.

There may be other techniques to recover from the “impossible” circumstance in which you find yourself, but the following is one that I have successfully used in the past.

It will not work in the following circumstances:

  • If you configured an EFI Firmware Password that will preclude recovery, unless you know that password.
  • It won’t work if you encrypted your startup volume with FileVault.

Please read everything that follows before continuing. If you have only one computer then you will need to print this for reference.

  • Power on or restart your Mac.
  • At the chime or grey screen, hold ⌘ and S on your keyboard (two fingers) to enter single-user mode.
  • At the localhost:/ root# prompt, type

 

fsck -fy

press Return.

This is a simple check for file system integrity and is optional. It may take a few minutes to complete during which time various messages will appear. None of them are relevant unless they indicate some unrecoverable error. Be patient. If you get concerned that the system has stalled or become unresponsive press the Return key. Nothing will happen other than to echo the Return character, advancing the text on the screen, confirming your Mac has not completely frozen.

When the integrity check completes pressing the Return key will result in the localhost prompt again, waiting for your input.

At the localhost:/ root# prompt, type each of the following lines, exactly as written, including capitalization, one line at a time, each line followed by the Return key. There is a single space preceding the first “slash” ( / ) character in each line:

mount -uw /

rm /var/db/.AppleSetupDone

reboot

 

The Mac will restart, and then take you through the entire setup and registration process that you have not seen since you originally unboxed it. Do not be concerned—none of the above deletes any information. All your pre-existing user accounts will still available, assuming they were not already erased prior to beginning this procedure.

Do not elect to transfer your information from another Mac: When you get to the “Transfer Information to This Mac” screen, select “Do not transfer any information now” and press Continue. Have your existing Apple ID and password ready. At the “Create a Computer Account” screen, create the new, temporary account using a different “Full name” and “Account name” than the one you already use. Remember the password you select. You don’t have to sign in to iCloud or anything else you might decide to do if you wanted to use that User Account for anything else.

When it completes, log in under that new account. Use System Preferences to change your normal account to “Allow user to administer this computer”. Log out, log in under your normal account and verify you can use it without restriction.

After that, you can safely delete the temporary account you just created by following these instructions: Delete a user or group – Apple Support. Before removing it, confirm you don’t need any of the files you might have created in that Account.

How to migrate iTunes library to new Apple Music app

How to migrate iTunes library to new Apple Music app

Upgraded to the newer macOS and Music app doesn’t show playlist or songs? Not a big deal, let’s show you how to migrate your old iTunes library to Music App.

  1. Hold down the OPTION key while opening the MUSIC app.
  2. A dialog box will appear, pick the option “Choose Library”.
  3. Navigate to your ITL file (not XML) for the old iTunes database you want to import and double click it.
  4. The MUSIC app will then ask you to SAVE this as a new Music Library.
  5. Give it a different name than your other library(s).
  6. Pick a location.

Once that is done, you still have one final step – to change THE DEFAULT DIRECTORY OF YOUR ACTUAL MUSIC FILES.

  1. Go to MUSIC preferences, select Files directory, and change it to where your actual audio files are.
  2. MUSIC app will then ask you to organize, click YES (it may take few hours depending on iTunes database size.

Hope this article helped you resolve Music app not showing your songs problem.

MacBook 2016+ disable auto boot, stop MacBook Auto Boot On Lid Open/Charger connected

MacBook 2016+ disable auto boot

Stop MacBook Auto Boot On Lid Open/Charger Connected

To disable boot features before a repair:

    1. Double click on the drive that contains the macOS.
    2. Open the Applications folder.
    3. Open the Utilities folder.
    4. Double click on the Terminal application.
    5. Type the following text EXACTLY as shown (the last two characters are zeroes):

sudo nvram AutoBoot=%00

To re-enable boot features after a repair:

  1. Double click on the drive that contains the macOS.
  2. Open the Applications folder.
  3. Open the Utilities folder.
  4. Double click on the Terminal application.
  5. Type the following text EXACTLY as shown (the last two characters are zeroes):

sudo nvram AutoBoot=%03

  • Shut down the computer and close the display.
  • Open the display and verify that the computer turns on.
create a bootable installer for macOS

How to create a bootable installer for macOS Big Sur

You can use an external drive or secondary volume as a startup disk from which to install the Mac operating system.

Create a bootable installer for macOS

These advanced steps are primarily for system administrators and others who are familiar with the command line. You don't need a bootable installer to install macOS, but it can be useful when you want to install macOS on multiple computers without downloading the installer each time.

Download macOS

  1. Download a macOS installer, such as macOS Big Sur or macOS High Sierra.
  2. When the macOS installer opens, quit it without continuing installation.
  3. Find the installer in your Applications folder as a single ”Install” file, such as Install macOS Big Sur.

Use the ‘createinstallmedia’ command in Terminal

  1. After downloading the installer, connect the USB flash drive or other volume you’re using for the bootable installer. Make sure that it has at least 12GB of available storage and is formatted as Mac OS Extended.
  2. Open Terminal, which is in the Utilities folder of your Applications folder.
  3. Type or paste one of the following commands in Terminal. These assume that the installer is still in your Applications folder, and MyVolume is the name of the USB flash drive or other volume you’re using. If it has a different name, replace MyVolume accordingly.
  4. Big Sur:*

    sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Big\ Sur.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume — /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Big\ Sur.app

  5. Catalina:*

    sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Catalina.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume

  6. Mojave:*

    sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Mojave.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume

  7. High Sierra:*

    sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume

  8. Sierra:

    sudo /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume –applicationpath /Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app

  9. El Capitan:

    sudo /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia –volume /Volumes/MyVolume –applicationpath /Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app

  10. Press Return after typing the command.
  11. When prompted, type your administrator password and press Return again. Terminal doesn’t show any characters as you type your password.
  12. When prompted, type “Y” to confirm that you want to erase the volume, then press Return. Terminal shows the progress as the bootable installer is created.
  13. When Terminal says that it’s done, the volume will have the same name as the installer you downloaded, such as Install macOS Mojave. You can now quit Terminal and eject the volume.
    How to create a bootable installer for macOS

* If your Mac is using macOS Sierra or earlier, include the –applicationpath argument. The Sierra and El Capitan commands show the proper format of this argument.

Use the bootable installer

After creating the bootable installer, follow these steps to use it.

  1. Connect the bootable installer to a compatible Mac.
  2. Use Startup Manager or Startup Disk preferences to select the bootable installer as the startup disk, then start up from it. Your Mac will start up to macOS Recovery.
    Learn about selecting a startup disk, including what to do if your Mac doesn’t start up from it.
  3. Choose your language, if prompted.
  4. A bootable installer doesn’t download macOS from the Internet, but it does require the Internet to get information specific to your Mac model, such as firmware updates. If you need to connect to a Wi-Fi network, use the Wi-Fi menu in the menu bar.
  5. Select Install macOS (or Install OS X) from the Utilities window, then click Continue and follow the onscreen instructions.

Learn more

For more information about the createinstallmedia command and the arguments that you can use with it, make sure that the macOS installer is in your Applications folder, then enter this path in Terminal:

Big Sur:

/Applications/Install\ macOS\ Big\ Sur.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia

Catalina:

/Applications/Install\ macOS\ Catalina.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia

Mojave:

/Applications/Install\ macOS\ Mojave.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia

High Sierra:

/Applications/Install\ macOS\ High\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia

Sierra:

/Applications/Install\ macOS\ Sierra.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia

El Capitan:

/Applications/Install\ OS\ X\ El\ Capitan.app/Contents/Resources/createinstallmedia