Re: litte understanding problem with test

[Bob Proulx]

address@hidden wrote:
> Thanks for your fast answer :)
> I tried it as user and it works, seems to be a root issue

"root", as in the superuser?  The user that has write permission for
all files on the system?

> address@hidden:/tmp$ echo foo>file && chmod 444 file && test ! -w file && 
> echo "no write permission"
> no write permission
> address@hidden:/tmp# echo foo>file && chmod 444 file && test ! -w file && 
> echo "no write permission"
> address@hidden:/tmp#

Correct.  The root user has "superuser" permissions and can write to
all files on the system.  (Let's not talk about NFS's root squash nor
security enhanced linux nor any of the others. :-)  Try it.  You will
find that as root you can actually write to those files.

Bob