[Sussex] Working with files from Windows partition

[Gavin Stevens]

Steve,

On Mon, 6 Jun 2005 01:27:58 +0100
Steve Dobson <steve at dobson.org> wrote:

> > I notice that in Ubuntu, root has a run level (is that the right
> > term?) of 755, but viewing files in My Documents via Nautilus, shows
> > these files with a level of 744, thus the Ubuntu root can't alter
> > permissions or anything, because its level is less powerful than the
> > level in My Documents.
> 
> "Run level" is not the right term.  These are the permissions of the
> file.*nix has three sets of permissions: owner permissions, group
> permissions, and other permissions.  Each set as three options: read,
> write and execute. Read and write options are obvious, execute allows
> you to run the file if it is a script or an executable - if it isn't
> then it has no effect.
> 
> The permissions of a file is reported in octal (base 8, values 0 - 7).
> With the first octal digit representing the owner permissions, the
> next octal digit the group permissions, and the last the other
> permissions. For the set options the first bit shows the read option,
> the second the write and the last execute.
> 
> Therefore 755 (111 101 101 when show in binary) gives the owner all 
> rights and the group and other permissions all grant read and execute.
> 
> Because your referenced "My Documents" and Win98 I am assuming that
> the files are on a FAT32 file system.  I don't remember what
> permissions FAT32 supports, but they don't map well to the *nix
> permissions so the FAT32 file system code under Linux fakes it, and
> only grants write rights to the user that "mount"ed the file-system.
>  
> > There is probably a good reason for this, but if it isn't too
> > dangerous, how would I change the run level of files in My Documents
> > so that the ordinary user account can access them?
> 
> The easiest way to to change the mount options in /etc/fstab and then
> have the user that wants to modify the files mount the file system.
> The options you want are "rw,user,noauto".  This set the filesytem
> to be mount read-write by any user and not done automagicly when Linux
> boots.  The line should look something like this:
> 
>   /dev/hda1     /win98    vfat    rw,user,noauto     0   0
> 
> Most desktop systems have a mounter command somewhere to allow the
> user to mount a file system no already mount (like the CDROM) or a USB
> disk. I don't know where that is under Ubuntu.
>  
> > I hope this makes sense to someone.
> 
> I hope my reply make sense to you.

Yes, it makes a lot sense. Many thanks for increasing my understanding.

Gavin.