File and Folder Permissions

You can change the permissions for all of the files and folders in your hosting account by going into the Web Based FTP in the control panel. You may give a file or folder one of the following permissions:

R: Set this to have the file or folder as read only.

W: Set this to have the file or folder as write only. A user can overwrite the file or if it is a folder, create new files and folders within the folder.

RW: Set this to give a file or folder read and write permissions.

M: Set this to give a file or folder modify permissions. This allows all the permissions of 'RW' plus the file or folder can be deleted.

F: Set this to give full access to a file or folder. This allows any operation on the file or folder and is rarley needed. Modify permissions are enough for almost any application.

If a script is giving you an error it may be because it is trying to access a resource that it does not have proper permission for. Try changing the permissions settings for the resource. By default, the cgi-bin and db directories have the Modify permission. This allows your scripts to read, create, modify and delete files/folders anywhere within the cgi-bin directory. The Modify permission is necessary on the db directory to ensure proper functionality of your MSACCESS databases.

CHMOD is a Unix command and will not work with our Windows servers. The ability to change permissions in our Web Based FTP is the equivalent of the CHMOD command. Some common Unix permissions and their Windows equivalents are as follows:

777 = F
666 = M
755 = M

The triplet set of numbers in Unix permissions refer to User, Group and Other. When dealing with Windows permissions, the F, M, R, RW, W permissions only apply to the anonymous Internet user that visits your Web Site from a web browser. Because of this difference, there is no direct comparison of Unix to Windows permissions. The best method to take when setting windows permissions is to leave everything in your Web Site as Read (with the exception of cgi-bin and db). Then set Modify on any directories that your scripts need to write or delete files in. (again, we recommend using the cgi-bin for this as it already has Modify permissions). This method will take care of just about any permissions problems you may encounter.

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