How do I change access to home partition

[michael123]

I've just switched from Mandriva 2010.2 to Kubuntu 12.04 and need to change my home folder permissions (home folder Mandriva) , when I check permission on home folder it is root and when I open a folder and check permissions its got (user 500) and it won't allow me to add anything. Any help would be appreciated. regards Michael

[vw72]

In a terminal type sudo chown -R your-userid /home/<foldername>
then type sudo chgrp -R your-userid /home/<foldername>

so if your your name was joe and your home folder was joe, you would open a terminal and type
sudo chown -R joe /home/joe
sudo chgrp -R joe /homejoe

That will set the user joe as the owner of all folders and files from /home/joe and below and also add them to the group called joe.

EDIT: basically, your problem is because user ids are actually numbers and Kubuntu starts with 1000, while it appears that mandriva started with 500. The above commands will reset them to the proper value for Kubuntu (but then they will be wrong if you were dual booting with Mandriva).

[michael123]

Thanks for your help (solved)

After a few goes and failed, I looked in KDE partition editor the home partition was called /media/2008_home, so I was typing in the incorrect name.
kinds regards - Michael

In a terminal type sudo chown -R your-userid /home/<foldername>
then type sudo chgrp -R your-userid /home/<foldername>

so if your your name was joe and your home folder was joe, you would open a terminal and type
sudo chown -R joe /home/joe
sudo chgrp -R joe /homejoe

That will set the user joe as the owner of all folders and files from /home/joe and below and also add them to the group called joe.

EDIT: basically, your problem is because user ids are actually numbers and Kubuntu starts with 1000, while it appears that mandriva started with 500. The above commands will reset them to the proper value for Kubuntu (but then they will be wrong if you were dual booting with Mandriva).

[Frank616]

michael123:

the home partition was called /media/2008_home, so I was typing in the incorrect name.

So, I assume that you have an external disk or a USB drive plugged into this machine? Kubuntu mounts external drives in /media. Is that what your issue has been?

Frank.

[michael123]

Home partition problem (solved)

No I was refering to a home partition for Mandriva.

I wiped Mandriva and put on Kubuntu and was having trouble with permissions on the Mandriva home partition which VW72 kindly helped me with and is now ok. regards Michael

michael123:



So, I assume that you have an external disk or a USB drive plugged into this machine? Kubuntu mounts external drives in /media. Is that what your issue has been?

Frank.

[Frank616]

Michael:

No I was refering to a home partition for Mandriva.

I wiped Mandriva and put on Kubuntu and was having trouble with permissions on the Mandriva home partition which VW72 kindly helped me with and is now ok

So, you have Kubuntu installed, and it is using /media/2008_home as your /home directory?

I'm only asking as, while what you have may work, either I am not understanding, or this is fairly unorthodox. As you have few posts here, I am guessing that you are relatively new to Linux. If so, then there may be things that can be done to prevent issues for you in the future.

Frank.

[michael123]

Home partition

Michael:



So, you have Kubuntu installed, and it is using /media/2008_home as your /home directory?

I'm only asking as, while what you have may work, either I am not understanding, or this is fairly unorthodox. As you have few posts here, I am guessing that you are relatively new to Linux. If so, then there may be things that can be done to prevent issues for you in the future.

Frank.

Hi Frank,
Yes fairly new to linux , I only joined up 3 days ago, what do you suggest as I would like to get the house in order so as not to have future problems. The partition in dolphin is called /media/2008_home/ and now I have full access. In KDE partition manager 1.0.3 its labelled - 2008_home, file system ext 3, mount point is /media/2008_home, partition type - logical, /dev/sda7. regards Michael

[Frank616]

Michael:

I'm going to call in the reserves here. I am in no way a Linux guru. Anyone else want to suggest a way to organize this home directory more effectively?

If it is working, perhaps nothing needs to be done. However, a /home directory is not ordinarily mounted off of /media. /media is used for temporary filesystems that come and go, like flash drives and such.

What do you have in /media/2008_home? Are you using Firefox / Thunderbird for mail? Were you using them before in Mandriva? If you ask Dolphin to show you hidden files, are there a lot of directories in /media/2008_home that begin with a dot? What exactly are you accessing in /media/2008_home that you need? Is this just personal stuff that you have created yourself, like word processing documents, pictures, and whatnot?

I am also assuming that you have a /home directory in your Kubuntu user account. Do you have similar directories in your Kubuntu /home directory that start with a dot? If so, then really, what is in /media/2008_home SHOULD be in your Kubuntu /home directory, not mounted off of media. Many programs, including KDE itself are going to put configuration files in /home. They will not ordinarily use and therefore maintain the configuration files that you have in /media/2008_home.

That is why I think we need to know exactly what it is that you are using in /media/2008_home. If you are not using the configuration files in /media/2008_home anyway, then we can treat what you have there as a data directory, and we can mount it in a better place than /media.

Frank.

[michael123]

re- /media/2008_home

Hi Frank, this is fairly long winded for you and thanks for your help and patience.
1. Everything in /media/2008_home is all my personal stuff, I have 80gb of personal stuff on a 200gb partition. I'm using Firefox and Thunderbird as was in Mandriva. Dolphin's hidden files mostly begin with a dot except for desktop documents downloads folders etc.
Yes have a seperate home directory in Kubuntu and yes lots begin with a dot, it appears to have a similar setup as the Mandriva home partition, Kubuntu has os and home on the same partiton whereas Mandriva has seperate.
I have one HDD 450gb divided into 20gb kubuntu (which use to be Mandriva) 200gb /media/2008_home (which use to be Mandriva home partition), 20gb windows7 and 200gb windows storage, I partitoned windows so as not to loose personal stuff in case of viruses or all the other problems associated with windows.
When I installed Mandriva its setup is different in that it creates 3 seperate partitons and gives the option of choosing how big to make them, i.e. os on one which I made 20 gb, a swap about 4gb and a home partition which I made 200gb. The /media/2008_home is just for storage now I suppose. regards - Michael

Michael:

I'm going to call in the reserves here. I am in no way a Linux guru. Anyone else want to suggest a way to organize this home directory more effectively?

If it is working, perhaps nothing needs to be done. However, a /home directory is not ordinarily mounted off of /media. /media is used for temporary filesystems that come and go, like flash drives and such.

What do you have in /media/2008_home? Are you using Firefox / Thunderbird for mail? Were you using them before in Mandriva? If you ask Dolphin to show you hidden files, are there a lot of directories in /media/2008_home that begin with a dot? What exactly are you accessing in /media/2008_home that you need? Is this just personal stuff that you have created yourself, like word processing documents, pictures, and whatnot?

I am also assuming that you have a /home directory in your Kubuntu user account. Do you have similar directories in your Kubuntu /home directory that start with a dot? If so, then really, what is in /media/2008_home SHOULD be in your Kubuntu /home directory, not mounted off of media. Many programs, including KDE itself are going to put configuration files in /home. They will not ordinarily use and therefore maintain the configuration files that you have in /media/2008_home.

That is why I think we need to know exactly what it is that you are using in /media/2008_home. If you are not using the configuration files in /media/2008_home anyway, then we can treat what you have there as a data directory, and we can mount it in a better place than /media.

Frank.

[Frank616]

Michael:

OK, IIUC, Kubuntu is using /home for its config files as per normal. If you are using Thunderbird for your mail, etc., then any mail you saved while using Thunderbird in Mandriva is not accessible in this current install, right? (unless you have only webmail accounts like GMail, Yahoo mail, or similar)

If we can determine that the Mandriva config files in /media/2008_home are not being used by Kubuntu, and that you are happy with that, then I'll know better what to suggest. Quite honestly, if that is the case, then perhaps nothing needs to be done.

Let me know.

Frank.

[michael123]

Mandriva 2008 home

Michael:

OK, IIUC, Kubuntu is using /home for its config files as per normal. If you are using Thunderbird for your mail, etc., then any mail you saved while using Thunderbird in Mandriva is not accessible in this current install, right? (unless you have only webmail accounts like GMail, Yahoo mail, or similar)

If we can determine that the Mandriva config files in /media/2008_home are not being used by Kubuntu, and that you are happy with that, then I'll know better what to suggest. Quite honestly, if that is the case, then perhaps nothing needs to be done.

Let me know.

Frank.

Hi Frank,
I'm using thunderbird and firefox and I copied emails,addresses and book marks over to the Kubuntu partition and all is ok there, so I think the Mandriva 2008_home will now become a storage partition and I have full access to it now so maybe it will be fine.
I have another problem with a computer connected to my TV, I put ArtistX (ubuntu) and decided to also put Kubuntu on to compare and I have permission problems with it, in that the partition with ArtistX is root and I would like to free up all permissions as there is nothing important on it. regards Michael

[Frank616]

Michael:

I'm using thunderbird and firefox and I copied emails,addresses and book marks over to the Kubuntu partition and all is ok there,

OK, that was my only concern. You've already done what needed to be done.

I think the Mandriva 2008_home will now become a storage partition and I have full access to it now so maybe it will be fine.

Seems reasonable. You can probably delete all the hidden files and folders in that partition if you want to.

I have another problem with a computer connected to my TV, I put ArtistX (ubuntu) and decided to also put Kubuntu on to compare and I have permission problems with it, in that the partition with ArtistX is root and I would like to free up all permissions as there is nothing important on it.

Sounds like we've come full circle. Won't the suggestions given to you by vw72 work here too?

Frank.

[michael123]

Thanks Frank,
I did what VW72 suggested and now have access to ArtistX's home folder which is good enough as I store recorded stuff from TV there as it has lots more room on it than the Kubuntu partition - thanks again - regards Michael