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 1.12 2017/07/04 06:53:12 wiz Exp $ 30.\" 31.Dd September 11, 2016 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. 65Symbolic links named by arguments are silently left unchanged unless 66.Fl h 67is used. 68.Pp 69The options are as follows: 70.Bl -tag -width Ds 71.It Fl H 72If the 73.Fl R 74option is specified, symbolic links on the command line are followed. 75(Symbolic links encountered in the tree traversal are not followed.) 76.It Fl L 77If the 78.Fl R 79option is specified, all symbolic links are followed. 80.It Fl P 81If the 82.Fl R 83option is specified, no symbolic links are followed. 84.It Fl R 85Change the user ID and/or the group ID for the file hierarchies rooted 86in the files instead of just the files themselves. 87.It Fl f 88Do not report any failure to change file owner or group, nor modify 89the exit status to reflect such failures. 90.It Fl h 91If 92.Ar file 93is a symbolic link, the owner and/or group of the link is changed. 94.It Fl v 95Cause 96.Nm 97to be verbose, showing files as they are processed. 98.El 99.Pp 100The 101.Fl H , 102.Fl L 103and 104.Fl P 105options are ignored unless the 106.Fl R 107option is specified. 108In addition, these options override each other and the 109command's actions are determined by the last one specified. 110The default is as if the 111.Fl P 112option had been specified. 113.Pp 114The 115.Fl L 116option cannot be used together with the 117.Fl h 118option. 119.Pp 120The 121.Ar owner 122and 123.Ar group 124operands are both optional, however, one must be specified; alternatively, 125both the owner and group may be specified using a reference 126.Ar rfile 127specified using the 128.Fl Fl reference 129argument. 130If the 131.Ar group 132operand is specified, it must be preceded by a colon (``:'') character. 133.Pp 134The 135.Ar owner 136may be either a user name or a numeric user ID. 137The 138.Ar group 139may be either a group name or a numeric group ID. 140Since it is valid to have a user or group name that is numeric (and 141does not have the numeric ID that matches its name) the name lookup 142is always done first. 143Preceding an ID with a ``#'' character will force it to be taken 144as a number. 145.Pp 146The ownership of a file may only be altered by a super-user for 147obvious security reasons. 148.Pp 149Unless invoked by the super-user, 150.Nm 151clears the set-user-id and set-group-id bits on a file to prevent 152accidental or mischievous creation of set-user-id and set-group-id 153programs. 154.Sh EXIT STATUS 155.Ex -std chown 156.Sh COMPATIBILITY 157Previous versions of the 158.Nm 159utility used the dot (``.'') character to distinguish the group name. 160This has been changed to be a colon (``:'') character so that user and 161group names may contain the dot character. 162.Sh SEE ALSO 163.Xr chflags 1 , 164.Xr chgrp 1 , 165.Xr find 1 , 166.Xr chown 2 , 167.Xr lchown 2 , 168.Xr fts 3 , 169.Xr symlink 7 170.Sh STANDARDS 171The 172.Nm 173command is expected to be POSIX 1003.2 compliant. 174.Pp 175The 176.Fl v 177option and the use of ``#'' to force a numeric lookup 178are extensions to 179.St -p1003.2 . 180.Sh HISTORY 181A 182.Nm 183utility appeared in 184.At v1 . 185