To all Linux experts out there,

hi... i am fairly new to linux world and trying to learn web administration using fedora core 3 as my OS and apache as my web server.

I am trying to setup default home directory permission for each new user created on the system (for the web purpose). After googling for a while, I learned that the default permission needs to be 755 for all the home directories created (so that the users can access the pages stored under public_html...yes, the I set the permission for public_html to be 755).

Now, I want to setup the default permission for each home directory created to be 755 automatically. can this be accomplished by editing the .bash_profile file under /etc/skel ?

I tried putting in the command chmod 755 $HOME in the .bash_profile (it was just a blind attempt...) and it didn't seem to work! (i am not surprised..hehe). Ofcourse, it got copied over to the newly created user but no effect in terms of what I want to accomplish...

Can anyone suggest me anything on how to establish this setup? Thank you very much in advance!

Try chmoding /etc/skel to be 755. This should be carried over when /etc/skel is copied for the new home directory.

It didn't work:-( FYI: the default permission on /etc/skel is set to 755 (drwxr-xr-x). However, to be sure I did a chmod 755 on that directory and created a new user account and the new account's home dir has the default permission of drwx------


Any other suggestions??

maybe umask wil help u
what do u get for running
umask

set that to

umask 0022

regards

umask for /etc/skel is 0022

and it is same as above for the home directories created...

I tried adding 'umask 0022' at the end of .bash_profile file located under /etc/skel and it didn't do the trick... logged in and logged out as the newly created user and the home directory has the still the same old default permission

Thanks for the suggestion! Any more??

how do u create new users??
and what do u get for
umask

regards

Yeah, you might need to run umask 0022 prior to creating the new user. My guess is your current umask is 0077.

Masand...to answer your question, I create a new user by issuing the following command on shell:

useradd USERNAME -g www -s /sbin/nologin -p PASSWORD

and if you are asking what do I get for umask for the newly created home dir then the answer is 0022 . As I said before, it is 0022 for both newly created dir and for the /etc/skel directory. It is the permission that differs.... (Please read one of my previous posts)

Matir... what do you mean by I need to run umask 0022 prior to creating a new user? where do you suggest me to run that?? Can you eloborate a little more on that... Do I have to run that manually everytime I create a new user?? I just want to automate the whole process of setting the right permissions for each newly created home dir...

Thank you both of you!

In a console, just like you would be about to add a new user, please run 'umask' by itself and post the output. You don't set umasks for directories, but for users.

when I enter the command 'umask' I get 0022

I did that as a root for the /etc/skel directory... then I did the same as both root and the newly created user under the home directory of the new user and I get the same 0022

how do u create new users???

Masand.... Please 'scroll up' and read one of my previous posts where I clearly explained how I do it....

Thanks

umask does not care about directories. Directories care about umask. According to http://lists.ssc.com/pipermail/linux...r/021773.html, which could be found by googling, you need to set the umask in /etc/logins.def.

Thanks for pointing me to that URL... it was helpful and I added UMASK 0022 to the file and created a new user.... Surprisingly enough the home dir got the permission I needed!

However, a new problem arised.... the permissions for 'public_html' or any other subdirs of /etc/skel/ is not carried over to the newly created user. The original permission for 'public_html' is set to 755 but for newly created user this directory has the permission of drwx------.

Just for fun, I changed the permission of 'public_html' to be 777, created a new user and the permission under the home dir is drwx------ for 'public_html'

I am confused to understand on what's going on now???

I wish I understood as well. I would've thought it performs a copy, preserving permissions, then chowns the files in question... or, for that matter, switches to the new user, and performs a copy, in which case the umask should take effect.