Unable to write to directory

Question

Hello and apologies if this has been asked...I couldn't find the answer easily.

I am using Ubuntu Server 12.04

I can't write to a directory where my user should belong to the directory's group...

total 12
-rw-rw-r-- 1 www-data root   30 Sep 17 13:34 index.php
drwxrwxr-x 7 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 twentyeleven
drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 twentyten

dp : dp adm cdrom sudo dip www-data plugdev lpadmin sambashare www-pub

Here is the updated listing...

-rw-rw-r-- 1 www-data root   28 Sep 17 13:34 index.php
drwxrwxr-x 3 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 plugins
drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 themes
dp@acme:/var/www/stlit/wp-content$ cd themes
dp@acme:/var/www/stlit/wp-content/themes$ ls -la
total 20
drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 .
drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 ..
-rw-rw-r-- 1 www-data root   30 Sep 17 13:34 index.php
drwxrwxr-x 7 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 twentyeleven
drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root 4096 Sep 17 13:34 twentyten

I am a noob to Ubuntu so I am sure this is a mistake on my part. Please let me know if I need to provide more information.

Answer 1

According to the listing above

drwxrwxr-x 4 www-data root .....

This means, that the first name www-data is the "owner" of the file, and the second one root is the "group" the file belongs to.

And since your user isn't in the root group (and it shouldn't!), you cannot modify the file, as only the owner and group have full access on the files.

1. To change the group of a file you need to use

   sudo chgrp "new-group-name" file
   

2. To change the owner of a file you need to use

   sudo chown "new-owner-name" file
   

3. If you want to change both, you can do it in a single command with:

   sudo chown "new-owner-name":"new-group-name" file
   

My best guess is that you needed to use chgrp but instead you used chown

Answer 2

If you mean either of twentyeleven or twentyten in that file listing, the group there is root, and the user is www-data, who owns those directories.

You will need to change the group of the files to the www-data group as well if you wish to write to them as that user. You probably want to do sudo chgrp -R www-data . in the directory containing those files and directories you want to edit as your user.