Jay, On Tuesday 23 August 2005 09:08, Jay Paulson wrote:
I have been messing around with file permissions on my SuSE box and found that the umask needs to be changed in order for files that are created in a directory to have group writable permission on them, otherwise they are set to not writable for the group. However, in my search to find an explanation of how umask works with all the different ways you can set it (022, 002, 0022, 0002, and more I'm sure) I haven't found anything that really explain what it does. Therefore, I'm a little bit lost on what to do.
Can anyone point me to a good resource for umask?
I've answered that in detail in this forum before: http://lists.suse.com/archive/suse-linux-e/2005-Mar/0360.html
When you set the umask can you set it for a certain directory and it's sub directories or is it system wide?
Neither. It is associated with a process and unless changed is inherited by subprocesses in a manner similar to the way the environment variables are inherited.
Are there any security risks for setting the umask to 002? (Whatever that actually does :-] )
Of course. They all depend on the nature of the use to which the system is being put. There is no inherent risk, despite the over-simplified rules you'll often hear in this sort of forum.
Thanks for any help! jay
Randall Schulz