SETEUID(2) Linux Programmer's Manual SETEUID(2)

NAME
       seteuid, setegid - set effective user or group ID

SYNOPSIS
       #include 
       #include 

       int seteuid(uidt euid);
       int setegid(gidt egid);

   Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see featuretestmacros(7)):

       seteuid(), setegid():
           BSDSOURCE || POSIXCSOURCE >= 200112L || XOPENSOURCE >= 600

DESCRIPTION
       seteuid()  sets the effective user ID of the calling process.  Unprivi‐
       leged user processes may only set the effective user  ID  to  the  real
       user ID, the effective user ID or the saved set-user-ID.

       Precisely the same holds for setegid() with "group" instead of "user".

RETURN VALUE
       On  success,  zero is returned.  On error, -1 is returned, and errno is
       set appropriately.

ERRORS
       EPERM  The calling process is not privileged (Linux: does not have  the
              CAPSETUID  capability in the case of seteuid(), or the CAPSET‐
              GID capability in the case of setegid()) and euid (respectively,
              egid)  is  not  the  real  user  (group)  ID, the effective user
              (group) ID, or the saved set-user-ID (saved set-group-ID).

CONFORMING TO
       4.3BSD, POSIX.1-2001.

NOTES
       Setting the effective user (group) ID to the saved  set-user-ID  (saved
       set-group-ID) is possible since Linux 1.1.37 (1.1.38).  On an arbitrary
       system one should check POSIXSAVEDIDS.

       Under libc4,  libc5  and  glibc  2.0  seteuid(euid)  is  equivalent  to
       setreuid(-1,  euid)  and hence may change the saved set-user-ID.  Under
       glibc 2.1 and later it is equivalent to  setresuid(-1,  euid,  -1)  and
       hence  does  not  change the saved set-user-ID.  Analogous remarks hold
       for setegid(), with the difference that the  change  in  implementation
       from  setregid(-1,  egid)  to setresgid(-1, egid, -1) occurred in glibc
       2.2 or 2.3 (dependeing on the hardware architecture).

       According to POSIX.1, seteuid() (setegid()) need not permit euid (egid)
       to be the same value as the current effective user (group) ID, and some
       implementations do not permit this.

SEE ALSO
       geteuid(2), setresuid(2), setreuid(2), setuid(2), capabilities(7), cre‐
       dentials(7)

COLOPHON
       This  page  is  part of release 3.53 of the Linux man-pages project.  A
       description of the project, and information about reporting  bugs,  can
       be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.



Linux                             2012-07-02                        SETEUID(2)