Create file with same ownership as the folder it is created in

[Feathers McGraw]

I have a script that needs to be run with sudo (or as root).

In the script, I create a file with "touch", but since the script is running as root the new file is owned by root.

I know how to change the ownership to a particular user if that user is known, but was wondering if there is a way to create a file that has the same permissions and ownership as the folder that it is in.

In the script, the file is always being created in the user's home folder, so if this is possible it would mean that whichever user ran the script would own the file.

Feathers

[andystmartin]

Have you tried the followin?
sudo -u user touch filename

[Feathers McGraw]

Thanks for the info!

How would I use this with a script?

If I run the script with sudo -u username /path/to/bash/script, then would all commands in the script be executed as username?

If I could use it for some of the commands, and not others, then that would be perfect.

Feathers

[Feathers McGraw]

So I thought I'd found a clever solution... apparently not! Here's a short version of my script, most stuff edited out to give you an easy working version:

#!/bin/bash

# some variables
FILES_FOLDER=~/personalised-hosts
WHITELIST_FILE=$FILES_FOLDER/whitelist

PERMISSION=$(ls -ld $FILES_FOLDER | awk '{print $3}')

if [ ! -f $WHITELIST_FILE ]
then
 echo "No whitelist file detected, creating a blank one here: $WHITELIST_FILE"
 touch $WHITELIST_FILE
fi

# Change ownership of files to match owner of $FILES_FOLDER
chown -R $PERMISSION:$PERMISSION $FILES_FOLDER

Before running the script, the files folder already exists, and is owned by me (username feathers-mcgraw).

feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ ls -l
total 12
drwxr--r-- 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Oct 31 20:40 bin
drwxr-xr-x 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Sep 19 06:08 Desktop
-rw-rw-r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 2284 Oct 14 12:17 sam@samhobbs.co.uk_public_key.asc
feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ mkdir personalised-hosts
feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ ls -l
total 16
drwxr--r-- 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Oct 31 20:40 bin
drwxr-xr-x 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Sep 19 06:08 Desktop
drwxrwxr-x 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Oct 31 20:48 personalised-hosts
-rw-rw-r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 2284 Oct 14 12:17 sam@samhobbs.co.uk_public_key.asc

I run the script, and afterwards:

feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ ls -l
total 16
drwxr--r-- 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Oct 31 20:40 bin
drwxr-xr-x 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Sep 19 06:08 Desktop
drw-r--r-- 2 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 4096 Oct 31 20:49 personalised-hosts
-rw-rw-r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 2284 Oct 14 12:17 sam@samhobbs.co.uk_public_key.asc
feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ cd personalised-hosts
bash: cd: personalised-hosts: Permission denied
feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ ls -l personalised-hosts
ls: cannot access personalised-hosts/hosts-system: Permission denied
ls: cannot access personalised-hosts/whitelist: Permission denied
ls: cannot access personalised-hosts/hosts-sources: Permission denied
ls: cannot access personalised-hosts/hosts-block-personal: Permission denied
ls: cannot access personalised-hosts/hosts-block: Permission denied
total 0
-????????? ? ? ? ?            ? hosts-block
-????????? ? ? ? ?            ? hosts-block-personal
-????????? ? ? ? ?            ? hosts-sources
-????????? ? ? ? ?            ? hosts-system
-????????? ? ? ? ?            ? whitelist
feathers-mcgraw@62-West-Wallaby-Street:~$ sudo ls -l personalised-hosts
total 1848
-rw-r--r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 939916 Oct 31 20:49 hosts-block
-rw-r--r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw 939916 Oct 31 20:49 hosts-block-personal
-rw-r--r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw    207 Oct 31 20:49 hosts-sources
-rw-r--r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw    237 Oct 31 20:49 hosts-system
-rw-r--r-- 1 feathers-mcgraw feathers-mcgraw      0 Oct 31 20:49 whitelist

Why is Kubuntu not letting me into the folder if I own it, and everything in it?!

Feathers

[oshunluvr]

Looks to me like you don't have the execute bit set on the directories. You can't parse a directory without the "x"

[Feathers McGraw]

That was it! Thank you so much

Pays to have all you knowledgeable old timers around

[oshunluvr]

...old timers...

excuse me?

[oshunluvr]

Roflmao ;d

[Feathers McGraw]

You're a Kubuntu veteran, and I'm a noob! Have only been using Linux since April