chown

The chown (change owner) command is used to change the user owner and/or the group owner of a given file, directory, or symbolic link. Typically, only the root user can change the ownership of a file to another user.

Basic Syntax

chown [OPTION]... [OWNER][:[GROUP]] FILE...

Common Options

Option	Description
-R, --recursive	Operate on files and directories recursively.
-v, --verbose	Output a diagnostic for every file processed.
-c, --changes	Like verbose but report only when a change is made.
--reference=RFILE	Use RFILE's owner and group rather than specifying them.

Real-world Examples

1. Change the owner of a file:

   sudo chown john document.txt

2. Change both the owner and group of a file:

   sudo chown john:developers project.zip

3. Change only the group of a file:

   sudo chown :developers shared_folder

   (Similar to chgrp)

4. Change ownership recursively for a directory:

   sudo chown -R www-data:www-data /var/www/html/