Changing File Ownership on Oak#

Requesting a change of file ownership on Oak#

Changing ownership of files on Oak is accomplished by submitting a request to srcc-support@stanford.edu. This email should include the following:

• What you want to change ownership of:
• Please include a list of files or directories with a full complete path (e.g., /oak/stanford/groups/path/to/myfile instead of path/to/myfile
• Permission from the owner:
• Because you're not already the owner, we'll need authorization from either the current owner of the files or the PI who owns the group space where the files reside. A reply to the request from their Stanford email account is sufficient.

Once these are received, SRCC staff will process the ownership change and create a file in the root of the affected directory that includes a log of all changes made so you can be sure of what was affected.

Why can't users change ownership of files they already own?#

In our shared Linux environment, chown, the command used to change file ownership, requires that a user be granted something called a CAP_CHOWN capability in order to use the command. Unfortunately, the scope of this permission cannot be limited to a user's own files. This means we can't allow you to chown your own files without giving you permission to chown files belonging to other users on Oak.