Mac OS X: The Missing Manual, Second Edition

Setting Up Accounts

If you like the idea of this multiple-accounts business, begin by opening System Preferences. In the System Preferences window, click Accounts.

The screen shown in Figure 11-2 appears, showing the list of everyone who has an account. If you’re new at this, there’s probably just one account listed here—yours. This is the account that Mac OS X created when you first installed it.

Administrator Accounts

It’s important to understand the phrase you see in the Kind column. On your own personal Mac, it probably says Admin next to your name. This, as you could probably guess, stands for Administrator.

Because you’re the person who installed Mac OS X to begin with, the Mac assumes that you are its administrator—the technical wizard who’s in charge of it. You’re the teacher, the parent, the resident guru. You’re the one who will maintain this Mac. Only an administrator is allowed to:

• Install new programs into the Applications folder.

• Add fonts (to the Library folder) that everybody can use.

• Make changes to certain System Preferences panels (including Network, Date & Time, Energy Saver, Login, and Startup Disk).

• Use the NetInfo Manager and Disk Utility programs.

• Create new folders outside of your Home folder.

• Decide who gets to have accounts on the Mac.

• Open, change, or delete anyone else’s files (Section 11.4).

In the olden days, there may have been a few Mac-heads who took charge of maintaining the computers, but there was no such thing as an Administrator account. This is unfamiliar ...