Bug 2234 - No longer able to run game with multiple user accounts.
Status: ASSIGNED
Alias: None
Product: Unreal Tournament 2004
Classification: Unclassified
Component: client
Version: 3355 (Sixth official retail patch)
Hardware: Macintosh MacOS X
: P2 major
Assignee: Ryan C. Gordon
QA Contact:
URL:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2005-04-05 18:08 EDT by Morgan Adams
Modified: 2005-05-20 09:02:44 EDT
0 users

See Also:



Description Morgan Adams 2005-04-05 18:08:22 EDT
Prior to patch 3355, all users on my Mac could run UT2004. Afterwards, only one user account can run 
it. There's no error, but the app barely flashes in the dock and then is gone.

It may be some new ownership/permission issue inside the app package. It seems that only the owner 
of the files "System/ut2004-bin" and "System/ucc-bin" can launch the game--which wasn't true before. 
Here's the whole story that makes me think that:

* I originally installed the game under my main admin account, and I've always applied the patches from 
there, including 3355.

* But most game play is through my non-admin "guest" account. That has always worked fine in the 
past.

* I have installed add-ons (maps, mods) into the app package from both accounts in the past--and they 
are fine as long as I make sure the files I drop in give Read access to everyone. The add-ons don't all 
share the same owner, but they all run no matter what account is logged in.

* FWIW, I notice that the owner of the UT2004 app itself is Guest: that's not who installed it, but I may 
have re-assigned some time so that Guest could put Damnation (or some other mod) into the package. 
Regardless, my main account was still able to play (and still owned most of the package contents)--and 
other accounts that owned NOTHING in the package were able to play too. All mods and everything.

* Then, after installing 3355, NOBODY could run the game. Not my main account, not Guest, and not 
other accounts either.

* So I went poking through the package and found that "System/ut2004-bin" and "System/ucc-bin" 
now gave No Access to "other" accounts. That wasn't true prior the patch, because every now and then I 
Select All inside System just to make SURE I don't have some added mutator or something set to No 
Access. (Also, Finder Command-R would not work on the alias in Content/Mac OS, even though Get 
Info shows the correct destination... maybe that's normal though).

* I thought that would explain why Guest couldn't play... but it didn't explain why my main account 
itself couldn't play either.

* I changed permissions on those 2 files so that Group and Other users all had full access. But it didn't 
help: NO accounts could launch the game.

* So I looked in all the package folders for anything else that denied access. I found nothing: all the files 
in the package were readable by all users.

* Then, discovering that the owner of the package was Guest (for whatever reason), I tried making the 
owner of those 2 System files ALSO be Guest.

* Bingo--now Guest can run the game. But before 3355, those two files were owned by me, different 
from the package owned by Guest, and it still ran. Something seems to have changed that made that be 
a problem. (Not that there's much NEED for people to give the package ownership to a different 
account, but that's what led me to this fix.) And FWIW, Command-R on the alias in Content/Mac OS still 
doesn't work--but the app launches regardless.

* However, no other account--not even the admin account that applied the patch--can play the game. 
ONLY the owner of the package (and of those 2 files) can play. Only Guest.

* BUT now when I change the ownership of those 2 files back to myself, I can play in my main account. 
Yes, that's just how things were before I made them match the package (owner Guest). It didn't work 
then, and now it does. But now Guest can no longer play.

* Bottom line: I can ONLY play from ONE account, but I can choose which one. Whatever account I give 
ownership of those 2 System files to is the one that can play. (Even thought that account doesn't own 
the app package itself.)

So I don't know if everyone has problems with multiple users and 3355, or if my setup triggered 
something, but this never happened before 3355.

I will also try to test on a second Mac with zero add-ons, if I can make the space to do so.
Comment 1 Ryan C. Gordon 2005-05-20 09:02:44 EDT
Permission issue introduced by the patch; will fix for the next patch.

--ryan.