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GID on NTFS File System

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GID on NTFS File System

Can you set group on a file or folder on NTFS file system? - No, ugh... Yes.

This question puzzled me for a long time but since it never really made it to my top priorities, I didn't look up for information on this. I thought of exploring this area more while I was researching something about NFS server.

I started with looking for the utilities (obviously, Windows-based ones) which can set this information for me. My search ended quickly with the chown.exe and chgrp.exe which you can install with Interix/SUA Base Utilities.

Using Process Monitor (replacement of Filemon and Regmon utilities) revealed that group information gets stored on the file system with an IRP_MJ_SET_SECURITY request -

The other interesting fact is this request originating from the POSIX subsystem (psxss.exe) which makes sense because chown.exe and chgrp.exe utilities are POSIX subsystem utilities.

This KB Article says -

In the Windows NT and Windows 2000 NTFS file system, each file also has an owner and a primary group. The primary group of a file is not used by the Win32 subsystem, but is present for programs that make use of the POSIX subsystem. When a file is created, the user who created the file becomes its owner and that user's primary group becomes the file's primary group. Access Control Entries (ACEs) are then added to the DACLs to assign permissions.

That makes it clear that none of other utilities I tried to use, could set this information because they were basically Win32 binaries and Win32 subsystem does not, in anyway, uses this information.

So the best practice would be to set correct primary groups for your users and then use Interix/SUA chown.exe and chgrp.exe utilities to manage them the way you want them to be seen by your UNIX clients.

Additional Note: The ls.exe and chmod.exe are other utilities which can help you do things the UNIX way.

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