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Many errors in OS X occur because of faulty permissions on the hard drive. You can generally prevent this by running the repair permissions function in the Macintosh Disk Utility. The Help Desk recommends running it at least once per month (once a week is even better) or whenever you install new software. To repair permissions, open a Finder window, select "Applications," and then double click the "Utilities" folder to open it:
(If Miss Mac has been to your house, you will find Disk Utility on your dock and can skip to picture three below)

Find and double click "Disk Utility" to open the program:

Select the volume on which you'd like to run the repair (for most people, it will just read "Macintosh HD"), make sure the disk first aid tab is blue and then click "Repair Disk Permissions" at the bottom. The process is automatic and will take several minutes to complete. You can do other things while this runs. You shouldn't worry about any of the results

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