A user writes:
I have two groups, A and B. There is a Master folder called MasterFolder, and multiple SubFolders. Group A needs permissions to all folders with various permissions. GroupB only needs Download and List permissions to the SubFolders. When I select the folder resource I want, select the group and change the permissions it applies the changes to all groups so I am unable to specify permissions on a per group basis.
In other words, the user wants to have a folder belong to two groups.
Our response:
CompleteFTP uses the UNIX permission model which imposes the restriction that each folder can only have one owner and one group. You can set permission for the owner, for the group and for everyone else (i.e. 'All users') independently.
This means you can't do exactly what I understand you want, which is to have a folder belong to two groups. You do have the following options though:
- Say MasterFolder maps to the Windows directory, C:\FTP. Set the group of MasterFolder to Group A. Now create a second virtual folder called MasterFolderB, which also maps to C:\FTP. Set the group of MasterFolderB to Group B. Group A members should access the folder through the FTP path /MasterFolder and Group B members should access it through /MasterFolderB. Although the FTP paths are different, the actual Windows directory is the same. The permissions to the Windows folder C:\FTP now effectively has two groups, even if they are through two different FTP paths. You can go ahead and set the group permissions for each virtual folder separately.
If you are using the option "User's home folder appears as root" then you can even hide the fact that the paths are different, by setting the home-folder of Group A users to /MasterFolder and that of Group B users to /MasterFolderB.
- Alternatively, if it's OK for anyone who logs into your FTP server to download the files then you could just use the 'All users' permission instead of defining Group B.
- And, if either of the groups has only one user then you could set the owner of MasterFolder to be that user and set the permissions for that user account directly instead of the group that it's a member of.
I hope one of those options is suitable.
- Hans (EnterpriseDT)
