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-   -   Question mark characters appear when changing the permissions of directory recursivel (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-newbie-8/question-mark-characters-appear-when-changing-the-permissions-of-directory-recursivel-4175495701/)

gonny95 02-20-2014 05:55 PM

Question mark characters appear when changing the permissions of directory recursivel
 
When I change permissions recursively ,for example:
Code:

chmod -R +rw /opt/VirtualBox
Then the permissions of all subfiles and subdirectories become questionmarks such as
d?????????
d?????????
-?????????
-?????????

jpollard 02-21-2014 01:02 PM

Basically, don't do that.

The places I've seen the ??? form are where the directory is a fuse mountpoint, and the implementation doesn't support it.

Since you didn't list what the contents of /opt/VirtualBox, it is a bit harder to go any farther.

Habitual 02-21-2014 03:03 PM

I'd think the installation of Virtualbox would set these permissions. They did on my host.
So why are you trying to change them?

What precipitated this action?

See http://susepaste.org/31236612 for a dump of what mine are.

It should be used as an indicator of what may need to be done, and in no way an instruction for you to replicate those on your host.

It all depends on why you are trying to change them.

gonny95 02-21-2014 06:14 PM

That was what I just took as an example
This is the problem of not only /opt/VirtualBox but also every folder which contains many subfiles and directories

astrogeek 02-21-2014 06:29 PM

The ???? result from having read but not execute permission on the directories.

I suspect that you may have done chmod -R 644 or chmod -R -x instead of chmod -R +rw.

In any event, use find to fix the directory permissions and then use find to change only the file permissions recursively.

gonny95 02-21-2014 06:47 PM

Yeah Thanks! that was the execute permission on a folder.
Is it necessary that a folder has a execute permission?

astrogeek 02-21-2014 06:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by gonny95 (Post 5122587)
Yeah Thanks! that was the execute permission on a folder.
Is it necessary that a folder has a execute permission?

Yes, in directory context the execute bit means that you have permission to traverse the directory. Having read, but not execute says that you can see the files in the directory but cannot access the inode information inside it. Hence, you see the files but not their permissions.

Find a quick reference here, or search for Unix directory permissions - it is a Unix thing.

gonny95 02-21-2014 07:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by astrogeek (Post 5122591)
Yes, in directory context the execute bit means that you have permission to traverse the directory. Having read, but not execute says that you can see the files in the directory but cannot access the inode information inside it. Hence, you see the files but not their permissions.

Find a quick reference here, or search for Unix directory permissions - it is a Unix thing.

Thank you sooooo much!!!!!!

astrogeek 02-21-2014 07:06 PM

You are welcome!


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