When installation is initially performed, the resulting installation is owned by a single
user or group. You can change file ownership and permissions after installation using the
chutils command.
Restriction: The set-permissions feature is not currently available
on Windows operating systems.
Verifying file permissions
Installation Manager reports an error when the user does not have appropriate system
permissions.
Setting file ownership and permissions with the
chutils command
You can use the chutils command to
set the file ownership and permissions for an entire installation to an owner or group that differs
from the user that performed the initial installation. The main benefit is the ability to have the
initial installation performed by one user and then have different users perform supported
operations such as feature installations, edition upgrades, maintenance installations (such as fix
packs or refresh packs), and feature-pack installations.
The command can be used for the
following:
- Add or remove the ability of other non-root users to update the installation
- Transfer all file ownership of the installation to another user
- Reestablish consistent file permissions for the entire installation
The command can edit the following ownership and permissions:
- File owner
- File group
- Owner permissions
You can only change owner permissions to the default values set during
installation using the -setmod reset parameter.
- Group permissions
You can elevate group permissions to match the owner permissions using the
-setmod grp2owner parameter.
Limitation: Do not
use chutils -setmod=grp2owner
to set
permissions if you want to update the product with a fix pack using group mode. In this case, use
chutils -setowner=user_name
.
- Others permissions
You can only change others, or "world," permissions to the default values
set during installation through the -setmod
parameter.
For more information on using the chutils command, read chutils command.
Troubleshooting
- Directory existence errors
If you have not yet created a profile after installing the
application server and you run the
chutils command, then you might experience a
profile-related directory error like the
following:
INFO: (Jul 17, 2008 16:16:35) Initializing permission utility...
INFO: (Jul 17, 2008 16:16:35) Executing commands...
INFO: (Jul 17, 2008 16:16:47) The directory does not exist: /data/WebSphere/AppServer/instutils/../properties/fsdb
INFO: (Jul 17, 2008 16:16:58) The permission utility has completed successfully.
Because
the overall process is successful, this message can be safely ignored in this situation.
- Menus and shortcuts
Existing menus and shortcuts are not
transferred after application server-owning users or groups are modified with the
chutils command. You must manually recreate the menu items and shortcuts for the
new owner of the application server installation. You might need to recreate the following menu
items and shortcuts:
- Profiles
- Configuration Migration Tool
- Online support
- Profile Management Tool