CIS 170F: Windows 7 Administration

Week 5

Managing File Systems
File and Folder Permissions
Permission Inheritance

  • By default, all files and folders contained in a folder inherit the permissions assigned during installation or assigned by you when you modify folder permissions. For a disk or other storage device, the top-level folder for inherited permissions is the root folder. For example, the top-level folder for the C: drive is the C:\ folder. Any permissions assigned to this folder are inherited by all other folders on the C: drive automatically. The same is true when you assign permissions to folders at any other level of the folder hierarchy. For example, if you change the permissions for the C:\Data folder, all files and folders contained in the C:\Data folder inherit these permissions by default.
  • When you are working with permissions, you can easily determine whether a permission is inherited. Inherited permissions are shaded (unavailable) and directly assigned permissions are not shaded. If you don't want a file or a folder to have the same permissions as a parent folder, you have several choices. You can:
    • Access the parent folder and configure the permissions you want all included files and folders to have.
    • Try to override an inherited permission by selecting the opposite permission. In most cases, Deny overrides Allow.
    • Stop inheriting permissions from the parent folder and then copy or remove existing permissions as appropriate.
  • If you want a file or a folder to stop inheriting permissions from a parent folder, follow these steps:
    1. In Windows Explorer, right-click the file or folder you want to work with and then select Properties.
    2. In the Properties dialog box, select the Security tab and then click Advanced. This opens the "Advanced Security Settings for" dialog box.
    3. On the Permissions tab, click Change Permissions. This opens an editable view of the Permissions tab in a new dialog box.
    4. Clear the "Include inheritable permissions from this object's parent" checkbox.
    5. In the Windows Security dialog box, click Add to convert and add the permissions that were applied previously through inheritance, or click Remove to remove the inherited permissions and apply only the permissions that you explicitly set on the folder or file.
    6. After you modify or remove additional permissions as necessary, click OK to save your settings.
  • Permission inheritance can be blocked. Once blocked, the object needs new permissions assigned to it.
  • Any file or folder can have additional permissions assigned directly to the object that combine with the inherited permissions.

Previous | File and Folder Permissions | Permissions and Rights | Default Folder Permissions | NTFS Standard Permissions | Individual NTFS Permissions | Permission Scope | Permission Inheritance | Effective Permission | Ownership | Auditing | Permission Changes When Content Is Copied or Moved | Permission Strategy Considerations | Next