Linux in a Nutshell, Fifth Edition

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Chapter 3: Linux Commands

This is the Title of the Book, eMatter Edition

Copyright © 2006 O’Reilly & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.

chown

chown [options] newowner files

chown [options] --reference=filename files

Change the ownership of one or more files to newowner. newowner

is either a user ID number or a login name located in /etc/passwd.

chown also accepts users in the form newowner:newgroup or

newowner.newgroup. The last two forms change the group owner-

ship as well. If no owner is specified, the owner is unchanged. With

a period or colon but no group, the group is changed to that of the

new owner. Only the current owner of a file or a privileged user

may change the owner.

Options

-c, --changes

Print information about files that are changed.

--dereference

Follow symbolic links.

-f, --silent, --quiet

Do not print error messages about files that cannot be

changed.

-h, --no-dereference

Change the ownership of each symbolic link (on systems that

allow it), rather than the referenced file.

-v, --verbose

Print information about all files that chown attempts to

change, whether or not they are actually changed.

-R, --recursive

Traverse subdirectories recursively, applying changes.

--reference=filename

Change owner to the owner of filename instead of specifying a

new owner explicitly.

--help

Print help message and then exit.

--version

Print version information and then exit.

chpasswd

chpasswd [option]

System ...