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Author: Florian Zieboll
Date:  
To: dng
Old-Topics: Re: [DNG] "post mortem" (was: Popcorn)
Subject: [DNG] basic Linux resources
On Sun, 20 Feb 2022 13:11:36 +0000
Antony Stone <Antony.Stone@???> wrote:

> On Sunday 20 February 2022 at 12:57:07, Florian Zieboll via Dng wrote:
>
> > Dear list,
> >
> > I just want to share the two most important things I learned
> > yesterday:
> >
> > 1.) I can "delete" files for which I do not have write permissions,
> > if the containing directory is writable by me:
>
> Indeed - this came as a surprise to me when I first found it.
>
> The explanation is remarkably simple:
>
> Write permissions on a *file* determine whether you can modify the
> *content* of the file. This has nothing to do with the *file name*
> (renaming or deleting).
>
> Write permissions on *the containing directory* determine whether you
> can delete or rename files in that contained directory. This is
> because a directory is essentially a file with a special type of
> content - names and pointers to other files (inodes).



Hallo Antony,

thank you for this impressively sleek explanation! Can you (or anybody
else here) recommend some similarly well-worded resources (a book!)
about these very basic principles, that help me getting my fragments of
knowledge into the bigger context?

As I believe that this topic is worth an own thread, I'll try to start
it with a link to the "Dokumentation für Administratoren" of Munich's
LiMux project (in german), which focuses on the application layer, but
is a real pleasure to read:

https://docplayer.org/67158191-Limux-dokumentation-fuer-administratoren-herausgegeben-vom-sachgebiet-linux-client-der-landeshauptstadt-muenchen-version-basisclient-1-1.html

Best regards and libre Grüße,
Florian