Permissions To Mounted Windows Server

i have mounted a windows server to which i can read and write. however, i am having problem with some files/ for instance, i am making a spread sheet with open office, and saving it as excel format (.xls), i can save it to the drive, however, when i open it back up again it's up as read-only.

to get around this i tried logging in to console and su to root and did chmod 777 -R /mnt/server folder im saving it to....

this didn't work, after opening it was still read only.

so i su to root again and did chmod 777 /mnt/server/.....file.xls and this has worked. however, every time i save a file i don't want to be doing this, why is it doing this, and is there a way of getting round it?

i have mounted the server to a home directory using cifs/samba. i don't mind changing permissions to 777 for me, since im the only user on linux using it, and it's not a folder with system files in so no security issue really.

any help/ideas much appreciated.

Ross.

Shouldn't be doing that from a windows server. Curious. Is this a cifs mount i.e. a mapping of a windows share. If yes then is the share on windows marked "allow network users to alter files" and those "full control" boxes ticked or like that? I imagine it is so that's probably not a help, but check anyway.

Swerdna

Shouldn't be doing that from a windows server. Curious. Is this a cifs mount i.e. a mapping of a windows share. If yes then is the share on windows marked "allow network users to alter files" and those "full control" boxes ticked or like that? I imagine it is so that's probably not a help, but check anyway.

Swerdna
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i don't have access to server at the moment but will try when i get chance. it's strange, since i know all windows client pcs (i'm the only pc using linux) have full read/write access to this folder... so it is strange, especially the fact i can write to it, save a file, open it, but then not edit and save it again without a chmod command. also i was surprised a chmod -R 777 command didn't work either...

as i say, i can fully read/write to the drive under normal conditions, i can save a new file there etc, just not alter an already saved file :huh:

will get back to you, any more suggestions welcome.

thanks again,

Ross.

As you probably know, windows applies file-locking methods to files which are flagged as already "in use".
I suspect the file, once created and saved isn't being released by the windows server.
You can browse (if you can get access to the server or get someone to have a look for you) which files are "in use" in the windows administration tools.

Also, if the mount-point is in parenthesis of a directtory which has conflicting permissions, then its possible for those permissions to apparently* be inherited by the file - so if /mnt/server is 777, but /mnt is 755, then /mnt/server may behave as 755 also.

I usually create a clean folder of /shares root:users 777 to create mountpoints in, so for your example I'd be looking at /shares/server with root:users 777 and root:users 775 respectively for those folders.

This bit is irrelevant in this instance, but for the sake of completeness, if this behaviour is seen on a linux samba server then check the create_mask line in smb.conf is 77x and not 75x or less.

(apparently, since windows doesn't support unix file flags)

windows has nothing to do with the issue. It is only applications

1) can't change permissions on windows box from samba (samba is nowhere close to windows ACL anyway)
2) openoffice has/had issues with files from networked disks
--- check /usr/bin/soffice file for
# file locking now enabled by default
SAL_ENABLE_FILE_LOCKING=1
export SAL_ENABLE_FILE_LOCKING

backup original soffice file, comment out above lines. Hopefully consequences are clear?

windows has nothing to do with the issue. It is only applications

1) can't change permissions on windows box from samba (samba is nowhere close to windows ACL anyway)
2) openoffice has/had issues with files from networked disks
--- check /usr/bin/soffice file for
# file locking now enabled by default
SAL_ENABLE_FILE_LOCKING=1
export SAL_ENABLE_FILE_LOCKING

backup original soffice file, comment out above lines. Hopefully consequences are clear?
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ok broch, thanks, i shall give this a try tomorrow

thanks also to eds, i shall try your suggestion as well. will just chmod to /mnt/work server
Ross.

Hi both Eds and broch,

just reporting back that after doing a chmod 777 "/mnt/work server" seems to have done the trick

thank you both for your help. guess i should have checked my mount point permissions too.

cheers again guys.
any more problems i'll be posting back

Ross.

me again,

another problem.

i tried copying a few files to a folder on the server, it worked for one, then i got an error 'unable to change permissions...'

these were video files, so it can't be open office this time. i have also done chmod 777 to the mount point of the server in my home directory. what could it be? surely the server not letting the files go? it thinks the file is still in use, when it's not? that is my guess.

any ideas?

Thanks.

What code do you use to mount the windows share?

Swerdna

What code do you use to mount the windows share?

Swerdna
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the temporary command:

username@suseclient:~> # mount -t cifs -o username=netuser,password=hiddenword //192.168.44.100/origin /home/username/destination

hmmm