Ubuntu Manpage: chacl - change the access control list of a file or directory

NAME

       chacl - change the access control list of a file or directory

SYNOPSIS

       chacl acl pathname...
       chacl -b acl dacl pathname...
       chacl -d dacl pathname...
       chacl -R pathname...
       chacl -D pathname...
       chacl -B pathname...
       chacl -l pathname...
       chacl -r pathname...

DESCRIPTION

       chacl is an IRIX-compatibility command, and is maintained for those users who are familiar
       with its use from either XFS or  IRIX.   Refer  to  the  SEE  ALSO  section  below  for  a
       description  of  tools  which  conform more closely to the (withdrawn draft) POSIX 1003.1e
       standard which describes Access Control Lists (ACLs).

       chacl changes the ACL(s) for a file or directory.  The ACL(s)  specified  are  applied  to
       each file in the pathname arguments.

       Each  ACL  is  a  string  which  is interpreted using the acl_from_text(3) routine.  These
       strings  are  made  up  of  comma  separated  clauses  each  of  which  is  of  the  form,
       tag:name:perm.  Where tag can be:

       "user" (or "u")
              indicating that the entry is a "user" ACL entry.

       "group" (or "g")
              indicating that the entry is a "group" ACL entry.

       "other" (or "o")
              indicating that the entry is an "other" ACL entry.

       "mask" (or "m")
              indicating that the entry is a "mask" ACL entry.

       name is a string which is the user or group name for the ACL entry.  A null name in a user
       or group ACL entry indicates the file's owner or file's group.  perm is the  string  "rwx"
       where each of the entries may be replaced by a "-" indicating no access of that type, e.g.
       "r-x", "--x", "---".

OPTIONS

       -b     Indicates that there are two ACLs to change, the first is the file access  ACL  and
              the second the directory default ACL.

       -d     Used to set only the default ACL of a directory.

       -R     Removes the file access ACL only.

       -D     Removes directory default ACL only.

       -B     Remove all ACLs.

       -l     Lists  the  access  ACL  and possibly the default ACL associated with the specified
              files or directories.  This option was added during the Linux port of XFS,  and  is
              not IRIX compatible.

       -r     Set the access ACL recursively for each subtree rooted at pathname(s).  This option
              was also added during the Linux port of XFS, and is not compatible with IRIX.

EXAMPLES

       A minimum ACL:

         chacl u::rwx,g::r-x,o::r-- file

       The file ACL is set so that the file's owner has "rwx", the  file's  group  has  read  and
       execute, and others have read only access to the file.

       An  ACL  that is not a minimum ACL, that is, one that specifies a user or group other than
       the file's owner or owner's group, must contain a mask entry:

         chacl u::rwx,g::r-x,o::r--,u:bob:r--,m::r-x file1 file2

       To set the default and access ACLs on newdir to be the same as on olddir, you could type:

         chacl -b `chacl -l olddir | \
             sed -e 's/.*\[//' -e 's#/# #' -e 's/]$//'` newdir

CAUTIONS

       chacl can replace the existing ACL.  To add or delete entries, you must first do chacl  -l
       to get the existing ACL, and use the output to form the arguments to chacl.

       Changing  the  permission  bits  of  a  file will change the file access ACL settings (see
       chmod(1)).  However, file creation mode masks (see umask(1)) will not  affect  the  access
       ACL settings of files created using directory default ACLs.

       ACLs  are  filesystem extended attributes and hence are not typically archived or restored
       using the conventional archiving  utilities.   See  attr(5)  for  more  information  about
       extended attributes and see xfsdump(8) for a method of backing them up under XFS.