chown(1)

1CHOWN(1)                         User Commands                        CHOWN(1)
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NAME

6       chown - change file owner and group
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SYNOPSIS

9       chown [OPTION]... [OWNER][:[GROUP]] FILE...
10       chown [OPTION]... --reference=RFILE FILE...
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DESCRIPTION

13       This manual page documents the GNU version of chown.  chown changes the
14       user and/or group ownership of each given file.  If only  an  owner  (a
15       user  name or numeric user ID) is given, that user is made the owner of
16       each given file, and the files' group is not changed.  If the owner  is
17       followed  by  a  colon  and a group name (or numeric group ID), with no
18       spaces between them, the group ownership of the  files  is  changed  as
19       well.  If a colon but no group name follows the user name, that user is
20       made the owner of the files and the group of the files  is  changed  to
21       that  user's  login  group.   If the colon and group are given, but the
22       owner is omitted, only the group of the files is changed; in this case,
23       chown  performs  the same function as chgrp.  If only a colon is given,
24       or if the entire operand is empty, neither the owner nor the  group  is
25       changed.
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OPTIONS

28       Change the owner and/or group of each FILE to OWNER and/or GROUP.  With
29       --reference, change the owner and group of each FILE to those of RFILE.
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31       -c, --changes
32              like verbose but report only when a change is made
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34       --dereference
35              affect the referent of each symbolic link (this is the default),
36              rather than the symbolic link itself
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38       -h, --no-dereference
39              affect each symbolic link instead of any referenced file (useful
40              only on systems that can change the ownership of a symlink)
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42       --from=CURRENT_OWNER:CURRENT_GROUP
43              change the owner and/or group of each file only if  its  current
44              owner  and/or  group  match those specified here.  Either may be
45              omitted, in which case a match is not required for  the  omitted
46              attribute.
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48       --no-preserve-root
49              do not treat `/' specially (the default)
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51       --preserve-root
52              fail to operate recursively on `/'
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54       -f, --silent, --quiet
55              suppress most error messages
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57       --reference=RFILE
58              use  RFILE's  owner and group rather than specifying OWNER:GROUP
59              values
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61       -R, --recursive
62              operate on files and directories recursively
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64       -v, --verbose
65              output a diagnostic for every file processed
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67       The following options modify how a hierarchy is traversed when  the  -R
68       option  is  also  specified.   If  more than one is specified, only the
69       final one takes effect.
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71       -H     if a command line argument is a symbolic link  to  a  directory,
72              traverse it
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74       -L     traverse every symbolic link to a directory encountered
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76       -P     do not traverse any symbolic links (default)
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78       --help display this help and exit
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80       --version
81              output version information and exit
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83       Owner  is  unchanged  if  missing.   Group is unchanged if missing, but
84       changed to login group if implied by a `:' following a symbolic  OWNER.
85       OWNER and GROUP may be numeric as well as symbolic.
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EXAMPLES

88       chown root /u
89              Change the owner of /u to "root".
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91       chown root:staff /u
92              Likewise, but also change its group to "staff".
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94       chown -hR root /u
95              Change the owner of /u and subfiles to "root".
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AUTHOR

98       Written by David MacKenzie and Jim Meyering.
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REPORTING BUGS

101       Report bugs to <bug-coreutils@gnu.org>.
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COPYRIGHT

104       Copyright © 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
105       This  is  free  software.   You may redistribute copies of it under the
106       terms      of      the      GNU      General       Public       License
107       <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.   There  is NO WARRANTY, to the
108       extent permitted by law.
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