Changing File Permissions & Upload in ASCII

File Permissions

The installation of a CGI script often requires a special file permission; however, please note that the appropriate permissions are set automatically upon upload to your cgi directory. However, in some instances it may still be necessary to set a file or directory permission.

Permissions are basically represented by a string with three sets of three characters. The first three characters show the read, write, and execute permissions for the owner; the next three characters show the permissions for the group to which the owner belongs to; and finaly, the last three set of characters show the access for everyone else.

For example, a file with the following permissions,

   rwxr-xr-r

has read, write, and execute access to the owner; read access to everybody else.

r = Readable
w = writable
x = executable
- = no permission

1. Make sure that you are connected to the internet.
2. Run the WS-FTP program (your FTP client) on your computer
3. Connect to your domain name and go to the directory with the file you want to change the permissions on
4. Select the file or directory whose permissions you want to change and right click on it
5. From the pop up menu choose "chmod (UNIX)"
6. When the "Remote file permissions window" comes up, edit the permissions by checking or unchecking the boxes.

Please do not forget that all CGI scripts must be uploaded to the sever in ASCII mode, not BINARY mode. This is a very common mistake and you can drive yourself crazy trying to figure out why your CGI script is not working. If using an FTP client, you most likely will have to manually set the transfer mode to ASCII to force the upload in ASCII mode. This bears repeating: all CGI scripts must be uploaded to the sever in ASCII mode, not BINARY mode.