recurring perms problems

[Avi Greenbury]

Gene Heskett wrote:

> About 1 or 2x a week, I discover something that isn't working due to
> perms.

This is normally caused by processes running as root when they
shouldn't be. If this repeatedly happens to the same files you might
find the easiest way to determine what's doing it is with a utility
like inotifywatch.

As far as digging around afterwards, the mtime of the file is not
updated by permissions changes, but the ctime is; the ctime is updated
when permissions or data are updated, mtime only when data is. That may
help you pin down when permissions changed, and perhaps help find a
rogue cron job or similar.

-- 
Avi