Chapter 15. Working with Other Users on One Computer

IN THIS CHAPTER:

110 Enable and Disable Automatic Login

111 Log In from the Login Window

112 Switch to Another User

113 Use the Shared Folder

114 Automatically Log Out

115 Require a Password When Reactivating the Computer

116 Lock the Screen

117 About Administrative Responsibilities

118 Add a New User

119 Grant Admin Capabilities to Another User

120 Restrict Another User's Capabilities (Parental Controls)

121 Change a User's Password

122 Delete a User

As a true multiuser operating system, Mac OS X gives you and the other members of your household, classroom, or business a great deal of flexibility in how you all share the use of the computer among yourselves. It also, however, introduces complexities that a single-user operating system lacks.

Security and convenience, it has been said, are mutually exclusive concepts. To make software easier to use and more convenient, software companies sometimes have to sacrifice the security of that software; the reverse is also true. For instance, an email program that automatically opens newly received messages is very convenient , but it is inherently insecure in that it can very easily execute a virus in one of those messages without your lifting a finger.

This principle is especially true when it comes to multiuser operating systems such as Mac OS X. This kind of system allows you to create multiple user environments, each tailored to the tastes of each person who uses the computer, and each secure from all the others on the same machine. But to properly take advantage of this added security and privacy, the users of the computer have to individually log ininstead of simply booting the computer into a single, common working environment as in the Windows and Mac OS systems of old. Indeed, many computer users even in the present day find the task of logging in and out to be too tediousand they don't use the multiuser features of their computers at all, allowing everybody to share a single user account and working environment. However, this practicebeyond simply lacking security and privacy for the computer's multiple usersmisses out on many of the coolest parts of Mac OS X, designed to make the process of switching from user environment to user environment pain-free and convenient.

This chapter discusses the various features of Mac OS X that ease the necessary discomforts associated with a multiuser operating system, allowing users of a single computer to share its resources, exchange files and information with each other, and switch quickly from one login session to another and back. It also discusses the administrative tasks that you, as the owner of the computer, will need to know how to performand exactly what makes an "administrator" so special.