1.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1991, 1993, 1994, 2003 2.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 3.\" 4.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 5.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 6.\" are met: 7.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 8.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 9.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 11.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 12.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 13.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 14.\" without specific prior written permission. 15.\" 16.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 17.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 18.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 19.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 20.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 21.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 22.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 23.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 24.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 25.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 26.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 27.\" 28.\" from: @(#)chown.8 8.3 (Berkeley) 3/31/94 29.\" $NetBSD: chown.8,v 1.7 2013/12/17 09:54:08 apb Exp $ 30.\" 31.Dd October 22, 2012 32.Dt CHOWN 8 33.Os 34.Sh NAME 35.Nm chown 36.Nd change file owner and group 37.Sh SYNOPSIS 38.Nm 39.Oo 40.Fl R 41.Op Fl H | Fl L | Fl P 42.Oc 43.Op Fl fhv 44.Ar owner Ns Op Ar :group 45.Ar 46.Nm 47.Oo 48.Fl R 49.Op Fl H | Fl L | Fl P 50.Oc 51.Op Fl fhv 52.Ar :group 53.Ar 54.Nm 55.Oo 56.Fl R 57.Op Fl H | Fl L | Fl P 58.Oc 59.Op Fl fhv 60.Fl Fl reference=rfile 61.Ar 62.Sh DESCRIPTION 63.Nm 64sets the user ID and/or the group ID of the specified files. 65.Pp 66The options are as follows: 67.Bl -tag -width Ds 68.It Fl H 69If the 70.Fl R 71option is specified, symbolic links on the command line are followed. 72(Symbolic links encountered in the tree traversal are not followed.) 73.It Fl L 74If the 75.Fl R 76option is specified, all symbolic links are followed. 77.It Fl P 78If the 79.Fl R 80option is specified, no symbolic links are followed. 81.It Fl R 82Change the user ID and/or the group ID for the file hierarchies rooted 83in the files instead of just the files themselves. 84.It Fl f 85Don't report any failure to change file owner or group, nor modify 86the exit status to reflect such failures. 87.It Fl h 88If 89.Ar file 90is a symbolic link, the owner and/or group of the link is changed. 91.It Fl v 92Cause 93.Nm 94to be verbose, showing files as they are processed. 95.El 96.Pp 97The 98.Fl H , 99.Fl L 100and 101.Fl P 102options are ignored unless the 103.Fl R 104option is specified. 105In addition, these options override each other and the 106command's actions are determined by the last one specified. 107The default is as if the 108.Fl P 109option had been specified. 110.Pp 111The 112.Fl L 113option cannot be used together with the 114.Fl h 115option. 116.Pp 117The 118.Ar owner 119and 120.Ar group 121operands are both optional, however, one must be specified; alternatively, 122both the owner and group may be specified using a reference 123.Ar rfile 124specified using the 125.Fl Fl reference 126argument. 127If the 128.Ar group 129operand is specified, it must be preceded by a colon (``:'') character. 130.Pp 131The 132.Ar owner 133may be either a user name or a numeric user ID. 134The 135.Ar group 136may be either a group name or a numeric group ID. 137Since it is valid to have a user or group name that is numeric (and 138doesn't have the numeric ID that matches its name) the name lookup 139is always done first. 140Preceding an ID with a ``#'' character will force it to be taken 141as a number. 142.Pp 143The ownership of a file may only be altered by a super-user for 144obvious security reasons. 145.Pp 146Unless invoked by the super-user, 147.Nm 148clears the set-user-id and set-group-id bits on a file to prevent 149accidental or mischievous creation of set-user-id and set-group-id 150programs. 151.Pp 152The 153.Nm 154utility exits 0 on success, and \*[Gt]0 if an error occurs. 155.Sh COMPATIBILITY 156Previous versions of the 157.Nm 158utility used the dot (``.'') character to distinguish the group name. 159This has been changed to be a colon (``:'') character so that user and 160group names may contain the dot character. 161.Sh SEE ALSO 162.Xr chflags 1 , 163.Xr chgrp 1 , 164.Xr find 1 , 165.Xr chown 2 , 166.Xr lchown 2 , 167.Xr fts 3 , 168.Xr symlink 7 169.Sh STANDARDS 170The 171.Nm 172command is expected to be POSIX 1003.2 compliant. 173.Pp 174The 175.Fl v 176option and the use of ``#'' to force a numeric lookup 177are extensions to 178.St -p1003.2 . 179