How do file permissions apply to symlinks?

vegan_vicky

Let's say you have this structure: + directory -- file1 -- file2 -- file3 -> /tmp/file3 file3 is a link to another file3 somewhere else on the system. Now let's say I chmod 777 the directory and all contents inside it. Does my file3 in /tmp receive those permissions? Also, let's say we have the same situation but reversed. /tmp/file3 -> /directory/file3 If I apply the permissions on the file being linked to, how does that effect the link?

Originally asked by nopcorn on Stack Exchange (superuser) (CC BY-SA 3.0).

uphilltech

Great question — answering as the UphillTech team:

It depends on how you call chmod and the platform you are running on. For example, on a Linux system, man chmod says this: chmod never changes the permissions of symbolic links; the chmod system call cannot change their permissions. This is not a problem since the permissions of symbolic links are never used. However, for each symbolic link listed on the command line, chmod changes the permissions of the pointed-to file. In contrast, chmod ignores symbolic links encountered during recursive directory traversals. However, on a Mac, chmod can be used to modify the permissions of a symbolic link using options such as this (from man chmod ): -h If the file is a symbolic link, change the mode of...

Full answer by peth: https://superuser.stackexchange.com/a/303063 (CC BY-SA 3.0).

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