chown(1) chown(1)
NAME [Toc] [Back]
chown, chgrp - change file owner or group
SYNOPSIS [Toc] [Back]
chown [-h] [-R] owner[:group] file ...
chgrp [-h] [-R] group file ...
DESCRIPTION [Toc] [Back]
The chown command changes the owner ID of each specified file to owner
and optionally the group ID of each specified file to group.
The chgrp command changes the group ID of each specified file to
group.
owner can be either a decimal user ID or a login name found in the
/etc/passwd file.
group can be either a decimal group ID or a group name found in the
/etc/group file.
In order to change the owner or group, you must own the file and have
the CHOWN privilege (see setprivgrp(1M)). If either command is
invoked on a regular file by other than the superuser, the set-user-ID
and set-group-ID bits of the file mode (04000 and 02000 respectively)
are cleared. Note that a given user's or group's ability to use this
command can be restricted by setprivgrp (see setprivgrp(1M)).
Access Control Lists - HFS File Systems Only [Toc] [Back]
Users can permit or deny specific individuals and groups to access a
file by setting optional ACL entries in the file's access control list
(see acl(5)). When using chown in conjunction with HFS ACLs, if the
new owner and/or group of a file does not have an optional ACL entry
corresponding to user.% and/or %.group in the file's access control
list, the file's access permission bits remain unchanged. However, if
the new owner and/or group is already designated by an optional ACL
entry of user.% and/or %.group in the file's ACL, chown sets the
corresponding file access permission bits (and the corresponding base
ACL entries) to the permissions contained in that entry.
Access Control Lists - JFS File Systems Only [Toc] [Back]
Users can permit or deny specific individuals and groups to access a
file by setting optional ACL entries in the file's access control list
(see aclv(5)). When using chown in conjunction with JFS ACLs, if the
new owner and/or group of a file have optional ACL entries
corresponding to user:uid:perm and/or group:gid:perm in the file's
access control list, those entries remain in the ACL but no longer
have any effect, being superseded by the file's user::perm and/or
group::perm entries.
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chown(1) chown(1)
Options [Toc] [Back]
chown and chgrp recognize the following options:
-h Change the owner or group of a symbolic link.
By default, the owner or group of the target file that a
symbolic link points to is changed. With -h, the target
file that the symbolic link points to is not affected. If
the target file is a directory, and you specify -h and -R,
recursion does not take place.
-R Recursively change the owner or group. For each file
operand that names a directory, the owner or group of the
directory and all files and subdirectories in the file
hierarchy below it are changed.
EXTERNAL INFLUENCES [Toc] [Back]
Environment Variables
LC_MESSAGES determines the language in which messages are displayed.
If LC_MESSAGES is not specified in the environment or is set to the
empty string, the value of LANG is used as a default for each
unspecified or empty variable. If LANG is not specified or is set to
the empty string, a default of "C" (see lang(5)) is used instead of
LANG.
If any internationalization variable contains an invalid setting,
chown behaves as if all internationalization variables are set to "C".
See environ(5).
International Code Set Support [Toc] [Back]
Single- and multi-byte character code sets are supported.
RETURN VALUE [Toc] [Back]
chown and chgrp return the following values:
0 Successful completion.
>0 An error condition occurred.
EXAMPLES [Toc] [Back]
The following command changes the owner of the file jokes to sandi:
chown sandi jokes
The following command searches the directory design_notes and changes
each file in that directory to owner mark and group users:
chown -R mark:users design_notes
WARNINGS [Toc] [Back]
The default operation of chown and chgrp for symbolic links has
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chown(1) chown(1)
changed as of HP-UX release 10.0. Use the -h option to get the former
default operation.
FILES [Toc] [Back]
/etc/group
/etc/passwd
SEE ALSO [Toc] [Back]
chmod(1), setprivgrp(1M), chown(2), group(4), passwd(4), acl(5),
aclv(5).
STANDARDS CONFORMANCE [Toc] [Back]
chown: SVID2, SVID3, XPG2, XPG3, XPG4, POSIX.2
chgrp: SVID2, SVID3, XPG2, XPG3, XPG4, POSIX.2
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