Free web hosts - triad s permissions to allow the otherfolks (those who
triad s permissions to allow the otherfolks (those who aren t the file s owneror in the specified group) to read and write to the file. But this method is apretty sloppy way of doing things because the whole idea of permissions is toreduce access, not to give everyone access. Instead, remember to change thefile s owner to the user tom. You do this with the chown(change owner) com- mand. For example, by typing chown tom comments, root changes the own- ership over to tom. Then tomcan work with this file and even change itspermissions to something he prefers. Hanging out in groupsGroups are more interesting to work with than owners. You use groups toallow the root user to assign to multiple users the ability to share certain filesystem areas. For example, in many versions of Linux, all users are added to a group named users(SuSE does this, for example).Then, rather than a longformat file listing such as the one shown in earlier in this chapter, you maysee the following: total 20drwx—— 2 dee users 4096 Jul 29 07:48 . drwxr-xr-x 5 root root 4096 Jul 27 11:57 .. -rw-r–r– 1 dee users 24 Jul 27 06:50 .bash_logout-rw-r–r– 1 dee users 230 Jul 27 06:50 .bash_profile-rw-r–r– 1 dee users 124 Jul 27 06:50 .bashrc-rw-rw-r– 1 dee users 0 Jul 29 07:48 lsfileIn other distributions (such as Fedora) a unique group is created for everyuser, which is why the earlier listings showed the owner and group items asidentical (dee dee). Comprehending file typesThe first letter in any long format file listing tells you which type of file you redealing with. In Table 10-1, I list the types you re likely to run into. Table 10-1Linux File TypesLabelTypeDescription-Regular fileThe item is an everyday file, such as atext file or program. bBlock deviceThe item is a driver(control program) fora storage medium,such as a hard driveor CD-ROM drive. (continued) 213Chapter 10: Manipulating Files and Directories16_