1.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1991, 1993, 1994 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.\" 4. 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.\" @(#)chown.8 8.3 (Berkeley) 3/31/94 29.\" $FreeBSD$ 30.\" 31.Dd February 21, 2010 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.Op Fl fhvx 40.Oo 41.Fl R 42.Op Fl H | Fl L | Fl P 43.Oc 44.Ar owner Ns Op : Ns Ar group 45.Ar 46.Nm 47.Op Fl fhvx 48.Oo 49.Fl R 50.Op Fl H | Fl L | Fl P 51.Oc 52.No : Ns Ar group 53.Ar 54.Sh DESCRIPTION 55The 56.Nm 57utility changes the user ID and/or the group ID of the specified files. 58Symbolic links named by arguments are silently left unchanged unless 59.Fl h 60is used. 61.Pp 62The options are as follows: 63.Bl -tag -width Ds 64.It Fl H 65If the 66.Fl R 67option is specified, symbolic links on the command line are followed. 68(Symbolic links encountered in the tree traversal are not followed.) 69.It Fl L 70If the 71.Fl R 72option is specified, all symbolic links are followed. 73.It Fl P 74If the 75.Fl R 76option is specified, no symbolic links are followed. 77This is the default. 78.It Fl R 79Change the user ID and/or the group ID of the specified directory trees 80(recursively, including their contents) and files. 81Beware of unintentionally matching the 82.Dq Pa ".." 83hard link to the parent directory when using wildcards like 84.Dq Li ".*" . 85.It Fl f 86Do not report any failure to change file owner or group, nor modify 87the exit status to reflect such failures. 88.It Fl h 89If the file is a symbolic link, change the user ID and/or the 90group ID of the link itself. 91.It Fl v 92Cause 93.Nm 94to be verbose, showing files as the owner is modified. 95If the 96.Fl v 97flag is specified more than once, 98.Nm 99will print the filename, followed by the old and new numeric user/group ID. 100.It Fl x 101File system mount points are not traversed. 102.El 103.Pp 104The 105.Fl H , 106.Fl L 107and 108.Fl P 109options are ignored unless the 110.Fl R 111option is specified. 112In addition, these options override each other and the 113command's actions are determined by the last one specified. 114.Pp 115The 116.Ar owner 117and 118.Ar group 119operands are both optional, however, one must be specified. 120If the 121.Ar group 122operand is specified, it must be preceded by a colon (``:'') character. 123.Pp 124The 125.Ar owner 126may be either a numeric user ID or a user name. 127If a user name is also a numeric user ID, the operand is used as a 128user name. 129The 130.Ar group 131may be either a numeric group ID or a group name. 132If a group name is also a numeric group ID, the operand is used as a 133group name. 134.Pp 135The ownership of a file may only be altered by a super-user for 136obvious security reasons. 137.Sh EXIT STATUS 138.Ex -std 139.Sh COMPATIBILITY 140Previous versions of the 141.Nm 142utility used the dot (``.'') character to distinguish the group name. 143This has been changed to be a colon (``:'') character so that user and 144group names may contain the dot character. 145.Pp 146On previous versions of this system, symbolic links did not have 147owners. 148.Pp 149The 150.Fl v 151and 152.Fl x 153options are non-standard and their use in scripts is not recommended. 154.Sh SEE ALSO 155.Xr chgrp 1 , 156.Xr find 1 , 157.Xr chown 2 , 158.Xr fts 3 , 159.Xr symlink 7 160.Sh STANDARDS 161The 162.Nm 163utility is expected to be 164.St -p1003.2 165compliant. 166.Sh HISTORY 167A 168.Nm 169utility appeared in 170.At v1 . 171