As you may or may not know this is the last issue of Kibbles I will be writing for. My time at Small Dog is coming to an end and I wanted to thank everyone who has read and replied to the articles I have written. It has been a pleasure sharing my Mac knowledge with you and learning a thing or two at the same time.
While I am sure that the next person to fill my shoes will continue on with Mac Treats I wanted my last one to be a bit of a doozy. A tip that would save you money and your blood pressure. Have you ever forgotten you password? I know that I have, but one of the more important ones to remember is your Administrator Password. If you have ever forgotten that one you might have found yourself paying someone to reset it for you when it is actually a very simple procedure to recover from.
I will say that by giving this information out some might think that I am treading in dangerous waters. Giving some the means to break into your computer, but this information is very easily found with a quick Google search. I’m sure that will make some readers wonder how safe their data really is. Well, Apple does have a FileVault encryption feature which will give you ultimate security if you need it. FileVault is so secure that you will not be able to use this Mac Treat to reset your password if you have it enabled.
Since FileVault is a topic for another writer I will get down to the goods. First things first, you need to be running either OS X Lion (10.7.x) or OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.x) because these have recovery partitions.
With that confirmed you need to restart your machine and hold down command+R once the screen goes black. This will force your computer to boot into its recovery mode while it is turning back on. Once there select Utilities > Terminal to launch the Terminal App. After that type resetpassword and hit Return. In the Reset Password window, select the appropriate startup volume, and choose your admin account. Enter a new password for the account and again to confirm. You can optionally add a password hint to help ensure this doesn’t happen again. Click Save and quit the Reset Password utility and Terminal. Then finally, reset your machine.
I really hope you all have enjoyed my articles and Mac Treats. This has been a fun experience and a informative one to boot! Enjoy the rest of your summer. I know that I will.
Mike out.