Looking at this listing, you see a 10-character block of dashes and letters (-rw-r--r--).
These characters identify the permissions for this file.
The first character in the block indicates whether the referenced file is a special file in
some way (d identifies it as a directory, c is for a character device, and b is for a block
device, such as a hard drive). We know this is a plain data file because there is a dash that
indicates that the file is not any of these special types. You??™ll learn more about the other
types of files and devices you may encounter in Chapter 18.
The default permissions for this file show us that the Owner of the file can Read and
Write it (rw-); it is Read-Only (r--) for both the Group and Others (the rest of the world).
If this was supposed to be an executable program file, a problem would exist, because no
one has permission to execute it.
Why Can??™t I Edit This File? How Permissions Work 89
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The next columns tell us other important things about this file:
. The number next to the permissions block shows the number of hard links to a file.
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