Patent ID: 6308173
Filing Date: 2001-10-23
Classification: G06F,H04L,Y10S

Abstract:
A method in a computer system for providing access control in a file system hierarchy, the file system hierarchy comprising a plurality of nodes arranged hierarchically such that each node may have one or more ancestor nodes and one or more descendant nodes, each node further capable of having an access control list identifying users that are permitted to access the node, the method comprising the steps of:receiving a request to modify, for a specified node having an access control list, the list of users permitted to access the specified node;modifying the access control list of the specified node in accordance with the received request;displaying a prompt for user input indicating whether the requested modification should be propagated to a descendant node of the specified node; andselectively merging the requested modification into an access list associated with the descendant node only if user input received in response to displaying the prompt indicates that the requested modification should be propagated to the descendant of the specified node.