bug#54338: closed (enhancement (documentation): explain permission tests in "test")

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Your message dated Fri, 11 Mar 2022 12:51:12 +0000
with message-id <75cef3c9-0129-bc8e-421a-624017f10822@draigBrady.com>
and subject line Re: bug#54338: enhancement (documentation): explain permission 
tests in "test"
has caused the debbugs.gnu.org bug report #54338,
regarding enhancement (documentation): explain permission tests in "test"
to be marked as done.

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54338: http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=54338
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> --- Begin Message ---
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> Subject: 
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> enhancement (documentation): explain permission tests in "test"
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> Date: 
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> Fri, 11 Mar 2022 11:42:13 +0100
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> I noticed that "test -r file" returns success when called as root for a file
> with these permissions:
> "--w-------" (see also https://stackoverflow.com/q/71435657/6607497)
>
> The documentation simply states:
> ‘-r FILE’
>      True if FILE exists and read permission is granted.
>
> Doing an strace it seems stat() is used to check the permissions (well, what
> about ACLs, just in case?)
>
> I think there should be a better explanatiomn how the permission tests work,
> especially when called as "root".
>
> (Report based on coreutils-8.32-150300.3.5.1 from openSUSE Leap 15.3)
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> --- End Message ---

--- Begin Message --- Subject: Re: bug#54338: enhancement (documentation): explain permission tests in "test" Date: Fri, 11 Mar 2022 12:51:12 +0000 User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:97.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/97.0

On 11/03/2022 10:42, Ulrich Windl wrote:

I noticed that "test -r file" returns success when called as root for a file
with these permissions:
"--w-------" (see also https://stackoverflow.com/q/71435657/6607497)

The documentation simply states:
‘-r FILE’
      True if FILE exists and read permission is granted.

Doing an strace it seems stat() is used to check the permissions (well, what
about ACLs, just in case?)

I think there should be a better explanatiomn how the permission tests work,
especially when called as "root".

(Report based on coreutils-8.32-150300.3.5.1 from openSUSE Leap 15.3)

I agree the current docs are ambiguous.
I'll apply the attached later to address this.

thanks,
Pádraig

test-access.diff
Description: Text Data

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