[X4U] Whither my desktop?

[Jim Robertson]

OS X 10.4.2 on a 1.25 GByte Al-15 PowerBook.

I'm on vacation in Hawaii and don't have access to repair utilities.

I just updated my trial version of StickyBrain (to 3.6.0), and when trying
to restart my computer, I was told there were users connected via Apple File
Sharing. That made me VERY paranoid, because I'm on my hotel's WayPort
802.11b network (it turns out, WITHOUT the Apple Firewall activated).

I suspect that the "connected user" may have been myself, because I think I
forgot to drag the disk image of my PowerBook drive to the trash on my home
dual G5 before leaving home 4 days ago. I've not shut down nor restarted the
PB since.

Will that cause this message at the time of attempted restart?

Now, on to the real question:

When I clicked the button to say "restart anyway", the computer screen
blackened, but I don't think it completely shut down; in any event it didn't
reboot. I pressed the power key for several seconds, then pressed it again
and it did start up (cold boot). HOWEVER, when the boot process completed,
there was NOTHING on my Desktop except the icon of my boot drive (and there
was LOTS of random stuff there before).

I suspect my directory is damaged somehow, and that I should attempt to
repair it when I get home with DiskWarrior, but does anyone have suggestions
now?

Is it possible that someone really DID hack into my PowerBook via the
hotel's wireless network and munge my desktop? I didn't think Macs were so
vulnerable. Is there some way I can find out who IS connected; e.g.,
NetInfoManager, or he Network pane in System Preferences?

Thanks so much

Jim Robertson
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