Well after pulling my hair out for hours and not being able to install MODx (im a real noob so dont laugh!!!), ive finally managed it and found a really helpful page for anyone trying to install this. With this help it installed first time.
Take a look at:
http://textpattern.net/wiki/index.php?title=Using_MAMP_(Macintosh-Apache-MySQL-PHP)_for_Macintosh
This will walk you through installing MAMP and tell you how to set up your database (which i now know needs to be made before installing MODx, also make a note of the user and passwords you use!), it then talks about installing textpattern, but basically do exactly the same but with your unzipped Modx folder (renaming it if you want), then when you type in localhost:8888/"your-modx-folder-name"/ it should say "Modx isnt installed do you want to install" obviously you do! then go through the install screens and use the information you used when setting up your database (databasename, user name and pasword), once youb have done this, it should install perfectly and you shouldnt get any permisson problems at all, at least i didnt.
im not coder i just want to learnabout modx and cms sites, but if any mac user or anyone else using mamp and modx wants help installing let me know.. you shouldnt need any help if you follow the instructions on the link above, thank god it was easy to do, if i can do it so can you!
