How to Change File Ownership

You must own a file or directory (or have root permission) to be able to change its owner.

1. Become superuser.

2. List the file permissions.

   # ls -l filename

   -l	Displays the long listing, which includes the owner of the file, displayed in the third column.
   filename	Is the specified file or directory.

3. Change the file owner.

   # chown new-owner filename

   Ownership is assigned to the new owner you specify.

4. Verify the file ownership change.

   # ls -l filename

Example--Changing File Ownership

# ls -l quest
-rw-r--r--  1 fred   staff    6023 Aug  5 12:06 quest
# chown ignatz quest
# ls -l quest
-rw-r--r--  1 ignatz   staff    6023 Aug  5 12:06 quest