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chmod

(PHP 4, PHP 5, PHP 7, PHP 8)

chmodChanges file mode

Description

chmod(string $filename, int $permissions): bool

Attempts to change the mode of the specified file to that given in permissions.

Parameters

filename

Path to the file.

permissions

Note that permissions is not automatically assumed to be an octal value, so to ensure the expected operation, you need to prefix permissions with a zero (0). Strings such as "g+w" will not work properly.

<?php
chmod
("/somedir/somefile", 755); // decimal; probably incorrect
chmod("/somedir/somefile", "u+rwx,go+rx"); // string; incorrect
chmod("/somedir/somefile", 0755); // octal; correct value of mode
?>

The permissions parameter consists of three octal number components specifying access restrictions for the owner, the user group in which the owner is in, and to everybody else in this order. One component can be computed by adding up the needed permissions for that target user base. Number 1 means that you grant execute rights, number 2 means that you make the file writeable, number 4 means that you make the file readable. Add up these numbers to specify needed rights. You can also read more about modes on Unix systems with 'man 1 chmod' and 'man 2 chmod'.

<?php
// Read and write for owner, nothing for everybody else
chmod("/somedir/somefile", 0600);

// Read and write for owner, read for everybody else
chmod("/somedir/somefile", 0644);

// Everything for owner, read and execute for others
chmod("/somedir/somefile", 0755);

// Everything for owner, read and execute for owner's group
chmod("/somedir/somefile", 0750);
?>

Return Values

Returns true on success or false on failure.

Errors/Exceptions

Upon failure, an E_WARNING is emitted.

Notes

Note:

The current user is the user under which PHP runs. It is probably not the same user you use for normal shell or FTP access. The mode can be changed only by user who owns the file on most systems.

Note: This function will not work on remote files as the file to be examined must be accessible via the server's filesystem.

See Also

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User Contributed Notes 6 notes

up
58
MethodicalFool
14 years ago
BEWARE, a couple of the examples in the comments suggest doing something like this:

chmod(file_or_dir_name, intval($mode, 8));

However, if $mode is an integer then intval( ) won't modify it. So, this code...

$mode = 644;
chmod('/tmp/test', intval($mode, 8));

...produces permissions that look like this:

1--w----r-T

Instead, use octdec( ), like this:

chmod(file_or_dir_name, octdec($mode));

See also: http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.octdec.php
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38
Geoff W
14 years ago
BEWARE using quotes around the second parameter...

If you use quotes eg

chmod (file, "0644");

php will not complain but will do an implicit conversion to an int before running chmod. Unfortunately the implicit conversion doesn't take into account the octal string so you end up with an integer version 644, which is 1204 octal
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36
masha at mail dot ru
19 years ago
Usefull reference:

Value Permission Level
400 Owner Read
200 Owner Write
100 Owner Execute
40 Group Read
20 Group Write
10 Group Execute
4 Global Read
2 Global Write
1 Global Execute

(taken from http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/php/2003/02/06/php_foundations.html)
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8
chris at ocproducts dot com
4 years ago
Windows has a very different file permission model to Unix and integrates them only minimally.

On Windows, all this function can do is to change the "read only" flag, which is turned on if $mode & 0200 does not pass.
i.e. it only checks if u+w is missing from the bitmask, and if it is, it sets the read only flag.

The executable flag cannot be set as Windows determines it based on file extension.
The write flag cannot be set as Windows determines write access based on ACLs, which are not integrated here.
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6
alex at feidesign dot com
19 years ago
If you cannot chmod files/directories with PHP because of safe_mode restrictions, but you can use FTP to chmod them, simply use PHP's FTP-functions (eg. ftp_chmod or ftp_site) instead. Not as efficient, but works.
up
2
sander
15 years ago
if you want to chmod directories too, use this

<?php
$iterator
= new RecursiveIteratorIterator(new RecursiveDirectoryIterator($pathname), RecursiveIteratorIterator::SELF_FIRST);

foreach(
$iterator as $item) {
chmod($item, $filemode);
}
?>
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