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From: ka@spanky.UUCP (Kenneth Almquist)
Newsgroups: net.bugs,net.unix-wizards
Subject: Re: Usefulness of access(2) - (nf)
Message-ID: <495@spanky.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 2-Oct-83 02:04:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: spanky.495
Posted: Sun Oct  2 02:04:52 1983
Date-Received: Tue, 27-Sep-83 00:15:02 EDT
References: <2916@uiucdcs.UUCP> <172@laidbak.UUCP>
Organization: Bell Labs, Holmdel, N. J.
Lines: 14

I see little need for a function to check for access permission on a file
by the effective user/group id.  Simply doing a stat(2) on the file will
achieve the same result.

The problems with the proposed pathaccess system call are twofold.  First,
it would require a lot more work to implement than access.  Access simply
resets the effective id's temporarily and calls nami to check the permissions;
the proposed new call would have to do its own path search.

The second problem has to do with security.  Access will perform a directory
search even if the effective user id doesn't have execute permission on a
directory.  In the case of the more general call, care would have to be taken
to ensure that such searches didn't create a security hole.
					Kenneth Almquist