xref: /dragonfly/lib/libposix1e/acl.3 (revision 31524921)
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26.\" $FreeBSD: src/lib/libposix1e/acl.3,v 1.2.2.5 2001/12/20 16:27:06 ru Exp $
27.\"
28.Dd January 28, 2000
29.Dt ACL 3
30.Os
31.Sh NAME
32.Nm acl
33.Nd introduction to the POSIX.1e ACL security API
34.Sh LIBRARY
35.Lb libposix1e
36.Sh SYNOPSIS
37.In sys/types.h
38.In sys/acl.h
39.Sh DESCRIPTION
40As shipped,
41.Dx
42permits file systems to export
43Access Control Lists via the VFS, and provides a library for userland
44access to and manipulation of these ACLs, but support for ACLs is not
45provided by any file systems shipped in the base operating system.
46The library calls shipped with 4.0 include routines to allocate,
47duplicate, retrieve, set, and validate ACLs associated with file objects.
48As well as the POSIX.1e routines, there are a number of non-portable
49extensions defined that allow for alternative ACL semantics than the
50POSIX.1e semantics, such as AFS and NTFS semantics.  Where
51routines are non-standard, they are suffixed with _np to indicate that
52they are not portable.
53.Pp
54POSIX.1e describes a set of ACL manipulation routines to manage the
55contents of ACLs, as well as their relationships with files.  This
56manipulation library is not currently implemented in
57.Dx ,
58although
59a third party library was under development at the time this document
60was written.  There is a general consensus that the POSIX.1e manipulation
61routines are ambiguously defined in the specification, and don't meet the
62needs of most applications.  For the time being, applications may
63directly manipulate the ACL structures, defined in
64.In sys/acl.h ,
65although the
66recommended usage is to only ever handle text-form ACLs in applications,
67generated and maintained using
68.Fn acl_from_text
69and
70.Fn acl_to_text ,
71passed directly to and from the management routines.  In this manner,
72an application can remain safely unaware of the contents of ACLs.
73.Pp
74Available functions, sorted by behavior, include:
75.Pp
76.Fn acl_delete_def_file ,
77.Fn acl_delete_file_np ,
78.Fn acl_delete_fd_np
79.Pp
80These functions are described in
81.Xr acl_delete 3 ,
82and may be used to delete ACLs from file system objects.
83.Pp
84.Fn acl_free
85.Pp
86This function is described in
87.Xr acl_free 3 ,
88and may be used to free userland working ACL storage.
89.Pp
90.Fn acl_from_text
91.Pp
92This function is described in
93.Xr acl_from_text 3 ,
94and may be used to convert a text-form ACL into working ACL state, if
95the ACL has POSIX.1e semantics.
96.Pp
97.Fn acl_get_file ,
98.Fn acl_get_fd ,
99.Fn acl_get_fd_np
100.Pp
101These functions are described in
102.Xr acl_get 3 ,
103and may be used to retrieve ACLs from file system objects.
104.Pp
105.Fn acl_init
106.Pp
107This function is described in
108.Xr acl_init 3 ,
109and may be used to allocate a fresh (empty) ACL structure.
110.Pp
111.Fn acl_dup
112.Pp
113This function is described in
114.Xr acl_dup 3 ,
115and may be used to duplicate an ACL structure.
116.Pp
117.Fn acl_set_file ,
118.Fn acl_set_fd ,
119.Fn acl_set_fd_np
120.Pp
121These functions are described in
122.Xr acl_set 3 ,
123and may be used to assign an ACL to a file system object.
124.Pp
125.Fn acl_to_text
126.Pp
127This function is described in
128.Xr acl_to_text 3 ,
129and may be used to generate a text-form of a POSIX.1e semantics ACL.
130.Pp
131.Fn acl_valid ,
132.Fn acl_valid_file_np ,
133.Fn acl_valid_fd_np
134.Pp
135Thee functions are described in
136.Xr acl_valid 3 ,
137and may be used to validate an ACL as correct POSIX.1e-semantics, or
138as appropriate for a particular file system object regardless of semantics.
139.Pp
140Documentation of the internal kernel interfaces backing these calls may
141be found in
142.Xr acl 9 .
143The syscalls between the internal interfaces and the public library
144routines may change over time, and as such are not documented.  They are
145not intended to be called directly without going through the library.
146.Sh IMPLEMENTATION NOTES
147.Dx Ns 's
148support for POSIX.1e interfaces and features is still under
149development at this time.
150.Sh ENVIRONMENT
151POSIX.1e assigns security labels to all objects, extending the security
152functionality described in POSIX.1.  These additional labels provide
153fine-grained discretionary access control, fine-grained capabilities,
154and labels necessary for mandatory access control.  POSIX.2c describes
155a set of userland utilities for manipulating these labels.  These userland
156utilities are not bundled with
157.Dx
158so as to discourage their
159use in the short term.
160.\" .Sh FILES
161.Sh SEE ALSO
162.Xr acl 3 ,
163.Xr acl_dup 3 ,
164.Xr acl_free 3 ,
165.Xr acl_from_text 3 ,
166.Xr acl_get 3 ,
167.Xr acl_set 3 ,
168.Xr acl_to_text 3 ,
169.Xr acl_valid 3 ,
170.Xr acl 9
171.Sh STANDARDS
172POSIX.1e is described in IEEE POSIX.1e draft 17.  Discussion
173of the draft continues on the cross-platform POSIX.1e implementation
174mailing list.  To join this list, see the
175.Fx
176POSIX.1e implementation
177page for more information.
178.Sh HISTORY
179POSIX.1e support was introduced in
180.Fx 4.0 ,
181and development continues.
182.Sh AUTHORS
183.An Robert N M Watson
184.Sh BUGS
185These features are not yet fully implemented.  In particular, the shipped
186version of UFS/FFS does not support storage of additional security labels,
187and so is unable to (easily) provide support for most of these features.
188