Why am I not allowed to change any of the preferences in Finder's General preference pane, except for Spring-loaded folders? I am allowed to change any of Finder's Labels, Sidebar, or Advanced preferences, except for Show all filename extensions and Show warning before emptying the Trash.
I've tried deleting ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.finder.plist then restarting Finder, which recreates com.apple.finder.plist, but the problem persists.
I'm running OS X 10.6.8.
Best Answer
I assume your user are assigned administrator rights on the machine? Have you tried booting up in Safe Mode? Do the problem persist inside there?
To boot in safe mode:
Also, try to create a new user. Check if the problem appears on your new user as well.
Edit:
Found this to be a solution:
Move (dont delete in case something goes wrong) theese four files to your desktop from <~/Library/Preferences> and make a full reboot. Not necessary to do safe mode for this operation. Just Cut and paste the files directly.
The files should appear after a reboot, and hopefully fix your problem.