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CHOWN(1P)		   POSIX Programmer's Manual		     CHOWN(1P)

PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux
       implementation of this interface may differ (consult the	 corresponding
       Linux  manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the interface may
       not be implemented on Linux.

NAME
       chown - change the file ownership

SYNOPSIS
       chown [-hR] owner[:group] file ...

       chown -R [-H | -L | -P ] owner[:group] file ...

DESCRIPTION
       The chown utility shall set the user ID of the file named by each  file
       operand to the user ID specified by the owner operand.

       For  each file operand, or, if the -R option is used, each file encoun‐
       tered while walking the directory trees specified by the file operands,
       the chown utility shall perform actions equivalent to the chown() func‐
       tion defined in the System Interfaces volume  of	 IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,
       called with the following arguments:

	1. The file operand shall be used as the path argument.

	2. The	user  ID  indicated  by the owner portion of the first operand
	   shall be used as the owner argument.

	3. If the group portion of the first operand is given,	the  group  ID
	   indicated by it shall be used as the group argument; otherwise, the
	   group ownership shall not be changed.

       Unless chown is invoked by a process with appropriate  privileges,  the
       set-user-ID  and	 set-group-ID  bits of a regular file shall be cleared
       upon successful completion; the set-user-ID and	set-group-ID  bits  of
       other file types may be cleared.

OPTIONS
       The  chown  utility  shall  conform  to	the Base Definitions volume of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.

       The following options shall be supported by the implementation:

       -h     If the system supports user IDs for  symbolic  links,  for  each
	      file  operand  that  names  a  file of type symbolic link, chown
	      shall attempt to set the user ID of the symbolic link.   If  the
	      system supports group IDs for symbolic links, and a group ID was
	      specified, for each file operand that names a file of type  sym‐
	      bolic  link, chown shall attempt to set the group ID of the sym‐
	      bolic link. If the system does not support user or group IDs for
	      symbolic	links, for each file operand that names a file of type
	      symbolic link, chown shall do nothing more with the current file
	      and shall go on to any remaining files.

       -H     If  the -R option is specified and a symbolic link referencing a
	      file of type directory is specified on the command  line,	 chown
	      shall  change  the  user	ID (and group ID, if specified) of the
	      directory referenced by the symbolic link and all files  in  the
	      file hierarchy below it.

       -L     If  the -R option is specified and a symbolic link referencing a
	      file of type directory is	 specified  on	the  command  line  or
	      encountered  during  the	traversal  of  a file hierarchy, chown
	      shall change the user ID (and group ID,  if  specified)  of  the
	      directory	 referenced  by the symbolic link and all files in the
	      file hierarchy below it.

       -P     If the -R option is specified and a symbolic link	 is  specified
	      on  the  command	line  or encountered during the traversal of a
	      file hierarchy, chown shall change the owner ID (and  group  ID,
	      if  specified)  of the symbolic link if the system supports this
	      operation. The chown utility shall not follow the symbolic  link
	      to any other part of the file hierarchy.

       -R     Recursively  change file user and group IDs. For each file oper‐
	      and that names a directory, chown shall change the user ID  (and
	      group  ID,  if  specified) of the directory and all files in the
	      file hierarchy below it. Unless a -H, -L, or -P option is speci‐
	      fied,  it	 is unspecified which of these options will be used as
	      the default.

       Specifying more than one of the mutually-exclusive options -H, -L,  and
       -P  shall  not be considered an error.  The last option specified shall
       determine the behavior of the utility.

OPERANDS
       The following operands shall be supported:

       owner[:group]
	      A user ID and optional group ID to  be  assigned	to  file.  The
	      owner portion of this operand shall be a user name from the user
	      database or a numeric user ID. Either specifies a user ID	 which
	      shall  be	 given to each file named by one of the file operands.
	      If a numeric owner operand exists in the user database as a user
	      name, the user ID number associated with that user name shall be
	      used as the user ID. Similarly, if the group portion of this op‐
	      erand  is present, it shall be a group name from the group data‐
	      base or a numeric group ID. Either specifies a  group  ID	 which
	      shall  be	 given to each file. If a numeric group operand exists
	      in the group database as a group name, the group ID number asso‐
	      ciated with that group name shall be used as the group ID.

       file   A pathname of a file whose user ID is to be modified.

STDIN
       Not used.

INPUT FILES
       None.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The  following  environment  variables  shall  affect  the execution of
       chown:

       LANG   Provide a default value for the  internationalization  variables
	      that  are	 unset	or  null.  (See the Base Definitions volume of
	      IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section  8.2,  Internationalization	 Vari‐
	      ables  for the precedence of internationalization variables used
	      to determine the values of locale categories.)

       LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values  of  all
	      the other internationalization variables.

       LC_CTYPE
	      Determine	 the  locale  for  the	interpretation of sequences of
	      bytes of text data as characters (for  example,  single-byte  as
	      opposed to multi-byte characters in arguments).

       LC_MESSAGES
	      Determine	 the  locale  that should be used to affect the format
	      and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard error.

       NLSPATH
	      Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of
	      LC_MESSAGES .

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.

STDOUT
       Not used.

STDERR
       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES
       None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.

EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:

	0     The utility executed successfully and all requested changes were
	      made.

       >0     An error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       Default.

       The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE
       Only the owner of a file or the user with  appropriate  privileges  may
       change the owner or group of a file.

       Some implementations restrict the use of chown to a user with appropri‐
       ate privileges.

EXAMPLES
       None.

RATIONALE
       The System V and BSD versions use different  exit  status  codes.  Some
       implementations used the exit status as a count of the number of errors
       that occurred; this practice is unworkable since it  can	 overflow  the
       range  of valid exit status values. These are masked by specifying only
       0 and >0 as exit values.

       The functionality of chown is described	substantially  through	refer‐
       ences	to    functions	  in   the   System   Interfaces   volume   of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001. In this way, there is no  duplication  of	effort
       required	 for  describing  the  interactions  of	 permissions, multiple
       groups, and so on.

       The 4.3 BSD method of specifying both owner and group was  included  in
       this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 because:

	* There	 are  cases  where  the	 desired  end  condition  could not be
	  achieved using the chgrp and chown (that only changed the  user  ID)
	  utilities.  (If  the	current	 owner	is not a member of the desired
	  group and the desired owner is not a member of  the  current	group,
	  the  chown()	function  could	 fail  unless both owner and group are
	  changed at the same time.)

	* Even if they could be changed independently, in cases where both are
	  being	 changed,  there is a 100% performance penalty caused by being
	  forced to invoke both utilities.

       The BSD syntax user[. group] was changed to user[: group] in this  vol‐
       ume  of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 because the period is a valid character in
       login  names  (as  specified  by	 the  Base   Definitions   volume   of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, login names consist of characters in the portable
       filename character set). The colon character was chosen as the replace‐
       ment  for  the  period character because it would never be allowed as a
       character in a user name or group name on historical implementations.

       The -R option is considered by some observers as an undesirable	depar‐
       ture  from  the	historical  UNIX  system tools approach; since a tool,
       find, already exists to recurse over directories, there seemed to be no
       good  reason to require other tools to have to duplicate that function‐
       ality.  However, the -R option was  deemed  an  important  user	conve‐
       nience,	is far more efficient than forking a separate process for each
       element of the directory hierarchy, and	is  in	widespread  historical
       use.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.

SEE ALSO
       chmod,  chgrp,  the  System  Interfaces volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,
       chown()

COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in  electronic  form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX),	The  Open  Group  Base
       Specifications  Issue  6,  Copyright  (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of
       Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open  Group.  In  the
       event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
       The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group  Standard
       is  the	referee document. The original Standard can be obtained online
       at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE/The Open Group		     2003			     CHOWN(1P)
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