getacl(1)

getacl -- display discretionary information for a file(s)

Synopsis

getacl [-ad] file . . .

Description

For each argument that is a regular file, special file, or named pipe, getacl displays the owner, group, and the Access Control List (ACL). getacl displays the owner, group, and the ACL and/or the default ACL. Only directories contain default ACLs.

With the -a option specified, the filename, owner, group, and the ACL of the file will be displayed. With the -d option specified, the filename, owner, group, and the default ACL of the file, if it exists, will be displayed. With options not specified, the filename, owner, group, and both the ACL, and the default ACL, if it exists, will be displayed.

This command may be executed on a file system that does not support ACLs. It will report the ACL consisting of only the owning user, owning group, class and other entries, based on the permission bits.

When multiple files are specified on the command line, a blank line will separate the ACL for each file. The format of an ACL is:

   # file: filename
   # owner: uid
   # group: gid
   user::perm
   user:uid:perm
   group::perm
   group:gid:perm
   class:perm
   other:perm
   default:user::perm
   default:user:uid:perm
   default:group::perm
   default:group:gid:perm
   default:class:perm
   default:other:perm

The first three lines show the filename, the file owner, and the file owning group. Note that when only the -d option is specified, and the file has no default ACL, only these three lines will be displayed.

The user entry without a user ID indicates the permissions that will be granted to the owner of the file. One or more additional user entries indicate the permissions that will be granted to the specified users. The group entry without a group identifier indicates the permissions that will be granted to the owning group of the file. One or more additional group entries indicate the permissions that will be granted to the specified groups. The other entry indicates the permissions that will be granted to others.

The default entries (default:user, default:group, and default:other) may only exist for directories, and indicate the default user, group, and other entries that will be added to a file created within the directory.

The uid is a login name, or a user ID if there is no entry for the uid in the system's password file; gid is a group name, or a group ID if there is no entry for the gid in the system's group file; and perm is a three character string composed of the letters representing the separate discretionary access rights: r (read), w (write), x (execute/search), or the placeholder character -. The perm will be displayed in the following order: rwx. If a permission is not granted by an ACL entry, the placeholder character will appear.

The ACL entries will be displayed in the order in which they will be evaluated when an access check is performed. The default ACL entries which may exist on a directory have no effect on access checks.

The file owner permission bits represent the access that the owning user ACL entry has. The file group class permission bits represent the most access that any additional user entry, additional group entry, or the owning group entry may grant. The file other permission bits represent the access that the other ACL entry has. If a user invokes the chmod command and changes the file group class permission bits, the access granted by the additional ACL entries may be restricted.

In order to indicate that the file group class permission bits restrict an ACL entry, getacl will display, after each affected entry, text in the form #effective:perm, where perm will show only the permissions actually granted.

Files

/etc/passwd: for user IDs
/etc/group: for group IDs

Examples

Given file filea, with an ACL five entries long, the command

$ getacl filea

would print:

# file: filea
# owner: fletcher
# group: us
user::rwx
user:spy:---
user:archer:rw-
group::r--
class:rw-
other:---

Given file filea, with an ACL five entries long, after the command chmod 700 filea was issued, the command

$ getacl filea

would print:

# file: filea
# owner: fletcher
# group: us
user::rwx
user:spy:---
user:archer:rw- #effective:---
group::r-- #effective:---
class:---
other:---

Given directory fileb, with an ACL containing default entries, the command

$ getacl -d fileb

would print:

# file: fileb
# owner: fletcher
# group: us
default:user::rwx
default:user:spy:---
default:group::r--
default:other:---

Given directory fileb, the command

$ getacl fileb

would print:

# file: fileb
# owner: fletcher
# group: us
user::rwx
user:spy:---
user:archer:rw-
group::r--
other:---
default:user::rwx
default:user:spy:---
default:group::r--
default:other:---

References

acl(2), aclsort(3C), chmod(1), ls(1), setacl(1)

Notices

The output from getacl will be in the correct format for input to the setacl command. If the output from getacl is redirected to a file, the file may be used as input to setacl. In this way, a user may easily assign one file's ACL to another file.