I would like to set permissions on users that I add for my SSH. I would like it so users can only stay in one directory and not leave it but allow them to have write/read access from within their directory. Is this possible? And is there an easy way to do this? Thanks.

hmm..I'm not a permissions pro (yet, at least) and I'm kind of a busy now, but one thing that came to my mind was this:

you create dir for the user, make it's permissions so that the user can reside in it (owner or so), and s/he cannot go "outside" it (a bit like home directories, but more strictly so the user doesn't have permissions to read /usr/bin and so on, either...dunno why you'd like to do this, though, because then s/he wouldn't be able to do anything...that is, if s/he only had read permissions to that one single dir). anyway.

then you would make some files readable/writeable by that user, with a new group or something, whatever you wish. put the files inside a dir that the user has no access to..so he can't straight open the file. then you would create a symlink to that single file, inside the user's dir, so that the user would have permissions to the symlink and to the file through it... (I have no idea if this works, if the user cannot read the directory the actual file is in).

so the user would use the files through symlinks. I have really no idea if this works (so I guess it doesnt hehe), but try it out if you can't figure anything else out.

the usual method for confining a user or process to a directory and it's subdirectories is to use the chroot program to give a false root directory. If you do this and do not provide copies or hardlinks
to binaries such as cp and mv, and some libraries from /usr/lib, the user will not be able to make much use of their read/write access. Note that symlinks will not work from a chroot'd environment as the location referenced cannot be reached.

Also re: bOuncer's post, access through a symlink uses the target file's permissions and not the symlink. I tried that one myself once :-). I haven't tried via a hard link.

Perhaps some more detail of your goal and someone will suggest a good solution for you.