chown: changing ownership not permitted, even though running as root

permissions ftp root ownership proftpd

24,940

Solution 1

I don't think VFAT supports the type of permissions you're trying to set. In such case, the permissions are set the same for all files, when mounting the disk. Something like:

sudo mount -t vfat -o uid=piftp,gid=piftp /dev/sda1 /var/www

See also Can't change permission/ownership/group of external hard drive on Ubuntu here on Super User, or the external resource Connect your Raspberry Pi to a USB hard disk.

Solution 2

OP wrote:

I solved my ftp problem by mounting with umask 0000

24,940

Marian Klühspies

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Updated on September 18, 2022

Comments

Marian Klühspies over 1 year
I managed to configure my Raspberry Pi as an FTP server with ProFTPD. The only problem is, I can´t upload and rename files and Windows Explorer says:

350 File or directory exists,ready for destination name
550 Rename xyz permission denied

Now I´ve read I have to chown this folder to the FTP user, but this does not work.

I have tried:
```
sudo chown -R pi /var/www (my default pi account)
sudo chown -R piftp /var/www (the ftp account)

sudo su
chown -R root /var/www
```
All I´m getting is

chown:changing ownership of ... : Operation not permitted

I already chmodded this directory to 777.

/var/www is mounted from a vfat volume on my external hard disc. Looking at it with ls -l I see all files and folders have owner root and group root and all of these folders have permissions drwxr-xr-x.

Can someone please help?
- Ramhound about 10 years
  
  What is the current owner of the folder?
- Marian Klühspies about 10 years
  
  The owner of www is pi
- Ramhound about 10 years
  
  Are you able to sudo other commands that normally require it. Its almost like the root doesn't even exist.
- Marian Klühspies about 10 years
  
  yes I am, I was also able to change the root password
- Arjan about 10 years
  
  What does ls -l give for the failing file or folder? And your "All I'm getting is chown:changing ownership of ... : Operation not permitted" applies to all files and folders, right? Or do some succeed? If some do succeed, is the file or folder that is failing any special? Like maybe that is a file that has been uploaded by Windows Explorer with some temporary name?
- Arjan about 10 years
  
  Which OS are you running on your Raspberry Pi? And what file system? (For that /var/www folder.) And maybe specifying the group is required in the chown command too?
- Marian Klühspies about 10 years
  
  ls -l gives me root root for all folders/files. if I´m root, im not getting the permission error. the rights of these folders are drwxr-xr-x. I´m running raspbian, the file system of my external hdd which is mounted in /var/www is vfat. No it´s no file or folder from windows explorer as the upload is not permitted :(
- Arjan about 10 years
  
  I've rolled back your edit; please note we're not a forum. (That's not different from Stack Overflow, which you've used a lot.) If you have additional questions, then post a new question for that. Of course, first search, as it might have been asked before.
- Arjan about 10 years
  
  possible duplicate of Can't change permission/ownership/group of external hard drive on Ubuntu
- Ramhound about 10 years
  
  I am going to have to roll back this question myself also. If you have resolved it yourself post an answer, don't post the solution in the question, thats not how this website works.
Marian Klühspies about 10 years

no effect at all, tried everything of those examples
Arjan about 10 years

Surely the output of ls -l must be different when you mount the drive like above, @Nachbar90?
Marian Klühspies about 10 years

the output for the mounted hdd is drwxr-xr-x 15 piftp piftp
Arjan about 10 years

Sounds like me that your "chown: changing ownership not permitted" has been answered then?
Marian Klühspies about 10 years

yes but not my real problem. The hdd is mounted as read only I think. The command for mounting it as rw is just giving me the mount infotable
Arjan about 10 years

See my comment to your question, about the rollback. And please read superuser.com/about Success!
Marian Klühspies about 10 years

Now I´m as wise as before. Still no chance to get my ftp working
Arjan about 10 years

Then just go ahead and ask another question about that (if it has not been asked before). Your own title for this question was "chown: changing ownership not permitted". By now you know that this was related to using an external drive, and how to set the ownership for external drives, so make sure you add that information to any new question you ask. Don't ask chameleon questions please. Success!