Mac 101: Disabling automatic login
If you use your Mac as a public computer (or family computer), then you might not always want it to load your user account when the computer starts up. By changing one option in the Accounts System Preference pane, you can have your Mac display a list of user accounts upon startup. Just open System Preferences and go to Accounts > Login Options. Click the "Automatic Login:" drop-down box and select "Disabled." Please note that you will need to authenticate as an administrator to change any of these settings.
You can further customize the "login window" by choosing either "List of users" or "Name and password." If "list of users" is selected, you will be prompted to click your user account name and give your password in order to login. If name and password is selected, you will need to type in both your username and password to login.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Marco said 10:26AM on 7-29-2008
I wonder if there is a possibility to bypass the automatic login by holding a key, I have a secondary account for some audio software, but the majority of the time I don't need to acces it. Anyone know if this is possible?
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ramkanda said 12:57PM on 7-29-2008
I'm a huge fan of TUAW, but I don't know if going into system preferences to change your system preferences is really a "tip".
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Boyo said 2:53PM on 7-29-2008
Yawn
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brad said 6:49PM on 7-29-2008
... and this is the moment that I stopped reading TUAW.
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droughtquake said 3:47AM on 7-30-2008
This is called 'Mac 101'. This tip is for new users who might not be aware of this feature.
If this article covers a topic that you feel is too elementary, you've probably graduated from needing to read the column.
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