Mac OS X 10.3.7: Root login problems: Workarounds for missing name/password dialog

After updating to Mac OS X 10.3.7, some users are no longer presented with the "Other" user that appears in the "list of users" version of the login screen if the root user is enabled.

Neal Skrenes, who manages about 60 eMacs, writes:

"About half of those exhibit the no 'Others' login if you log out of an automatic log in or if you have ["List of users" enabled]. I have no idea why this happens on only some machines as [ours] are all are built from a master image."

We should point out that we've received similar reports after a number of updates to Mac OS X. We're not sure why some updates introduce this bug, but here are a few workarounds to access the "Other" screen in order to log in as the root user:

• Press option-return, release, and then click on any user in the list of users; this should display the Name/Password login dialog.
• Download the free LoginWindow Manager, and use it to enable the "Show the 'Other...' user" option.
• Disable the root user and then re-enable it.

Since we don't recommend logging in as root -- there are few reasons for the average user to ever do so, and doing so can be quite dangerous -- we're not going to go through all the steps necessary to enable the root account. If you need to log in as root, you'll know how to do so.

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