So I have a Python Django web app that I have deployed on an internal network using Apache. Part of my web app allows the user to fill out a form - upon submit, the data is written to a json file in the home directory of my project – i.e. the data should be written to a file located in /var/www/html/project/data.json – unfortunately, I keep getting a “permission denied” error in the console.
I have tried chmod 777 /var/www/html/project/data.json
I’ve been stuck on this problem for quite a few hours and I am not sure how to go about this. Python doesn’t seem to offer an option where I can sudo write to the file. I am not sure what to do.
Not sure if this will help, but what I usually do is this:
I add my own user to the apache group (may not be necessary in your case, but anyway…). Note that if you do this you’ll have to logout and log back in.
I chown the entire project folder to me and the group (sudo chown -R user:apache /var/www/html/project)
I set permissions to 775 (user and group can do anything, others can’t): sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/html/project
I fear I do not have the ultimate solution for your problem, but maybe a step in it’s direction.
my experiences are with baikal (a dav server; now exchanged with radicale) which also needed write access in /var/www/dav.fritz.box/
rights/user/group were left to it’s defaults for /var/www/.
But for my dav-server the subdir:
chown apache:apache -Rf /var/www/dav.fritz.box
rights for the subdir “dav.fritz.box”: 755 for dir’s and 644 for files. ??? I guess Apache is writing in the subdir, not you or another user ( I’m unsure though) ???
maybe you’re able fetch some more selinux error’s with the package “setroubleshoot”
my virtualhost conf contains
…
<Directory “/var/www/dav.fritz.box/html”>
Options None
Options +FollowSymlinks
AllowOverride All
Require all granted
</Directory>
…
I’m not very experienced with webserver config, but I guest this is needed to do something with the above subdir (writing ?) . Got this from the baikal documentation !
So please consult your Django documentations.
Tried this. I still get “permission denied” – verified in console logs. Restarted computer too and apache server. Not sure if necessary to restart computer and apache server though. did it anyways for sanity check.
Ah okay, so I’ve actually come across other posts that recommend adding your own user to the apache group, but everytime I try to execute the command sudo adduser fac apache
, this is what I get:
Usage: adduser [options] LOGIN
adduser -D
adduser -D [options]
Options:
-b, --base-dir BASE_DIR base directory for the home directory of the
new account
…
Is this step necessary before continuing on with the next two bullet points?
Yes, you are correct – fac is the username.
Okay, I ran that command. I tried restarting my computer and the apache server, but I still am not able to write to the file located in /var/www/html/project/data.json.
Okay, actually I just arrived at the solution.
After completing usermod -a -G apache fac
I followed @galvao second two bullet points. This has now allowed me to write to /var/www/html/project/data.json.
– however, I’m assuming that the commands you wrote in your post will list the permissions.
For ls -la /var/www/html/project/, I get: drwxrwsr-x. 6 fac apache 4096 Aug 5 11:27 . drwxr-sr-x. 3 fac fac 4096 Aug 1 10:12 .. -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 52 Aug 1 10:12 .arcconfig drwxrwsr-x. 6 fac apache 4096 Aug 5 11:25 buttons -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 280 Aug 5 11:27 buttons.json drwxrwsr-x. 2 fac apache 4096 Aug 5 11:25 configuration_buttons -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 131072 Aug 1 10:12 db.sqlite3 drwxrwsr-x. 9 fac apache 4096 Aug 1 10:12 .git -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 819 Aug 1 10:12 manage.py drwxrwsr-x. 5 fac apache 4096 Aug 5 11:25 stations -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 354 Aug 1 10:12 stnconf.json
And for ls -la /var/www/html/project/data.json, I get: -rwxrwxr-x. 1 fac apache 280 Aug 5 11:27 /var/www/html/configuration_buttons/buttons.json
I’m curious though, I did try to chmod 777 /var/www/html/, but that didn’t solve my problem. I know that this is to be avoided for security purposes but I just wanted to see if it would do the trick. However, it didn’t. I came across many SO posts recommending this (along with the warning about security) and I am very confused as to why this did not work. Do you (or anyone else reading this) know why by any chance?
So I had to recopy changes into /var/www/html/project which means I totally deleted /var/www/html/project and ran $ cp -r project /var/www/html/. I am following the solution I arrived at to get here before but now I am unable to write to /var/www/html/project/data.json. Here is what I have done:
usermod -a -G apache fac
sudo chown -R user:apache /var/www/html/project
sudo chmod -R 775 /var/www/html/project
Yet this is not working this time around. Any ideas as to why?