Admin rights needed

N

Nytemagik

Bit poster
If this has been asked and answered, I apologize.

here is the situation.

My company is considering moving to a Parallels install in lieu of moving to Windows machines.
We run user account with an admin account on each machine.

I have tried to install every which way I could think of but...

When running Windows, in Parallels using Boot Camp, the app requests admin credentials when running as a normal user.

Obviously, i can't give out the admin password or it would defeat the purpose.

I have changed permissions on the Parallels app and that helped, but it appears the Boot Camp app is requesting the admin rights.

How can I change rights so a normal user can start up a Boot camp'ped XP install without needing admin rights??

Thanks

John
 
Thanks for answering, but is there an answer?? I made a "admin light" password I can share with certain users, but I'd really like to find a solution for this. The powers that be are looking hard at windows as a future move if i can't get this started.

Can access be granted for the boot sector of the windows drive??

John
 
there is no workaround, the bahaviour you are seeing is by design. Is bootcamp essential or can your users get by with a virtual hard disk file ?
 
You could try chmoding the disk partition file in /dev to change the permissions.

It works in Linux, but I have not tried it in Mac OS.

Be aware: This is usually a bad idea, as now any process can muck with your partitions and might break your filesystem.
 
wingdo said:
Already answered here. http://forums.parallels.com/thread10998.html
It's a function of OS X and Boot Camp. Parallels (or VmWare or whatever) are asking for r/w permission to a boot partition.
Click to expand...
The question wasn't answered... Rather it was just stating a related fact. The question is how to change rights on that particular disk/partition and those functions... If it is impractical to figure it out, say so. *kicks logical training* I'm probably being a pita right now.

Anyway, that rant off my chest.

Well, darkone, the answer is yes and no. Now that things are stabilized I might be taking some users off of BootCamp, but I really like preserving that 'back way in', so to speak. I would imagine there would be some way to script a start-up script that will give the particular user privilages to mounting that particular partition, no? Or is that just getting way to advanced. I'm a lousy scripter for all that is worth... I'm purely theoretical in practice, only scripting I'm good at is PHP. Hopefully it will change this Summer... We'll see.
 
unused_user_name said:
You could try chmoding the disk partition file in /dev to change the permissions.

It works in Linux, but I have not tried it in Mac OS.

Be aware: This is usually a bad idea, as now any process can muck with your partitions and might break your filesystem.
Click to expand...
Is there a way you could do it for ONLY the Parallels partition?
 
Eru Ithildur said:
The question wasn't answered... Rather it was just stating a related fact. The question is how to change rights on that particular disk/partition and those functions... If it is impractical to figure it out, say so. *kicks logical training* I'm probably being a pita right now.

Anyway, that rant off my chest.

Well, darkone, the answer is yes and no. Now that things are stabilized I might be taking some users off of BootCamp, but I really like preserving that 'back way in', so to speak. I would imagine there would be some way to script a start-up script that will give the particular user privilages to mounting that particular partition, no? Or is that just getting way to advanced. I'm a lousy scripter for all that is worth... I'm purely theoretical in practice, only scripting I'm good at is PHP. Hopefully it will change this Summer... We'll see.
Click to expand...

Actually the question was answered. Apple created OS X to have security, unused_user_name's workaround should work, but be advised you are totally and 100% opening up the boot camp partition to be written to by any rogue application at any time. You are asking for a way to bypass one of the cores of OS X security.

If this is for business, what do you actually need to run boot camp for? Boot camp is mostly for DirectX 9 and 1o support, gaming and 3D application support. What are you looking for that can't be done on a virtual HD?
 
wingdo said:
Actually the question was answered. Apple created OS X to have security, unused_user_name's workaround should work, but be advised you are totally and 100% opening up the boot camp partition to be written to by any rogue application at any time. You are asking for a way to bypass one of the cores of OS X security.

If this is for business, what do you actually need to run boot camp for? Boot camp is mostly for DirectX 9 and 1o support, gaming and 3D application support. What are you looking for that can't be done on a virtual HD?
Click to expand...
It's the sense of security we are after. That is, the warm fuzzy feeling of stability security, versus security stability, which is important too.

I understand the security issue, that's why I am looking for a specific way of opening ONLY the particular partition. ;) Maybe the effort of doing it is not worth it. Maybe there is a fairly easy way, that is what I am asking, and seeing that that question was not addressed the question was not answered.
 
I'll try to play around with the drive permissions this weekend (no promises) and see if something will give it full permissions and bypass the admin password request. I still think using a virtual hdd file is the best solution, if you need multiple people to be able to access the virtual hdd you should just be able to set it up in /Users/shared
 
Hey, thanks wingdo! Sorry if I sounded harsh... Just trying to get a point across.

I agree with you that the shared access is probably best... I might just be getting that set-up soon if things remain stable.

Now to go fix Open Directory that broke after changing an external IP with a new internet connection to the outside world... My weekend is going to be the joy of a re-install, it'll keep my brain in the most sound condition.
 
Eru Ithildur said:
I would imagine there would be some way to script a start-up script that will give the particular user privilages to mounting that particular partition, no?
Click to expand...

I did try to make a simple script that sudo-ed the user account with ALL rights and start the right VM -the one with BootCamp- via open command.

BUT at starting, Parallels still asks the Admin password, whereas the process in which Parallels was started should have Admin rights.

THEN why didn't it work ?
- does the script may actually transfer Admin rights to the Parallels Session ?
- is the authentication pop up from Parallels or OS X ?
- if it's from Parallels, where does Parallels checks Admin rights of the users before asking -of course, if the check is performed in NetInfo manager, it cannot succeed ?

Anybody any clue about all these ?
 
After help from forum-ers (MacBidouille.com good to know for all French-speaking Mac users), I got a WORKAROUND that works fine with 3188. That's a basic UNIX feature.

1) Edit sudoers and add a ALL / NO PASSWORD authorisation to your non-Admin user.

2) create the following shell script:

#!/bin/sh
#
sudo /Applications/Parallels/Parallels\ Desktop.app/Contents/MacOS/Parallels


3) Then you just have to run the script for setting an "admin environment" in which the Parallels process have Admin rights.

Note: if the shell script is named with a .command extension, you can run it by simply double-clicking it from the Finder.

OF COURSE : this workaround may be useless if you have defined more sophisticated sudoers authorisation for the whole operations of your non-admin user.
Otherwise, this workaround is SAFE: Admin authorisation only apply to the Parallels process -wellllll... assuming that providing Parallels with Admin rights is SAFE :D :D :D !

IMPORTANT for beginners (like me): you must edit /etc/sudoers ONLY with the visudo command -that works like vi-. The absolutely necessary thing you need to know about vi is ctrl-z (quit without saving changes). You will find more info about sudoers via the man command, and the file itself contains quite explicit samples.

Also, when creating a script shell, you must grant "execute" permission to the resulting file -via command chgmod 744 Name_of_File - otherwise it will not work.
 
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