> Hi, I've been looking through all kinds of docs looking for a definition of
> the 's' in a file permission.

in the case of an executable file, an s in the owner position means that the file is "setuid." that means whenever the program is executed, the process will have an effective userid of the file's owner rather than the executing user.

likewise, an s in the group position means that the file is "setgid." whenever the program is executed, the process will have an effective groupid of the file's group rather than the executing user's group.

s means something entirely different for directories. have a look at the man page for ls for more information.

> Can someone please explain what is means (system ?) and how to achieve it
> in a chmod ?

setuid: chmod 4755 filename

setgid: chmod 2755 filename

John Gordon

documented on: 2000.08.31 Thu 00:59:44