.\" DO NOT MODIFY THIS FILE!  It was generated by help2man 1.50.1.
.TH CHCON "1" "October 2026" "GNU coreutils 9.12" "User Commands"
.SH NAME
chcon \- change file security context
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B chcon
[\fI\,OPTION\/\fR]... \fI\,CONTEXT FILE\/\fR...
.br
.B chcon
[\fI\,OPTION\/\fR]... [\fI\,-u USER\/\fR] [\fI\,-r ROLE\/\fR] [\fI\,-l RANGE\/\fR] [\fI\,-t TYPE\/\fR] \fI\,FILE\/\fR...
.br
.B chcon
[\fI\,OPTION\/\fR]... \fI\,--reference=RFILE FILE\/\fR...
.SH DESCRIPTION
.\" Add any additional description here
.PP
Change the SELinux security context of each FILE to CONTEXT.
With \fB\-\-reference\fR, change the security context of each FILE to that of RFILE.
.PP
Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon--dereference'\fB\-\-dereference\fP\X'tty: link'
affect the referent of each symbolic link (this is
the default), rather than the symbolic link itself
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-h'\fB\-h, \-\-no\-dereference\fP\X'tty: link'
affect symbolic links instead of any referenced file
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-u'\fB\-u, \-\-user=\,USER\fP\X'tty: link'\/\fR
set user USER in the target security context
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-r'\fB\-r, \-\-role=\,ROLE\fP\X'tty: link'\/\fR
set role ROLE in the target security context
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-t'\fB\-t, \-\-type=\,TYPE\fP\X'tty: link'\/\fR
set type TYPE in the target security context
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-l'\fB\-l, \-\-range=\,RANGE\fP\X'tty: link'\/\fR
set range RANGE in the target security context
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon--no-preserve-root'\fB\-\-no\-preserve\-root\fP\X'tty: link'
do not treat '/' specially (the default)
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon--preserve-root'\fB\-\-preserve\-root\fP\X'tty: link'
fail to operate recursively on '/'
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon--reference'\fB\-\-reference=RFILE\fP\X'tty: link'
use RFILE's security context rather than specifying a CONTEXT value
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-R'\fB\-R, \-\-recursive\fP\X'tty: link'
operate on files and directories recursively
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-v'\fB\-v, \-\-verbose\fP\X'tty: link'
output a diagnostic for every file processed
.PP
The following options modify how a hierarchy is traversed when the \fB\-R\fR
option is also specified.  If more than one is specified, only the final
one takes effect. \fB\-P\fR is the default.
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-H'\fB\-H\fP\X'tty: link'
if a command line argument is a symlink to a directory, traverse it
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-L'\fB\-L\fP\X'tty: link'
traverse every symbolic link to a directory encountered
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html#chcon-P'\fB\-P\fP\X'tty: link'
do not traverse any symbolic links
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/chcon#chcon--help'\fB\-\-help\fP\X'tty: link'
display this help and exit
.TP
\X'tty: link https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/chcon#chcon--version'\fB\-\-version\fP\X'tty: link'
output version information and exit
.SH AUTHOR
Written by Russell Coker and Jim Meyering.
.SH "REPORTING BUGS"
Report bugs to: <bug\-coreutils@gnu.org>.
.br
Report any translation bugs to: <https://translationproject.org/team/>.
.br
GNU coreutils home page: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
.br
General help using GNU software: <https://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>
.SH COPYRIGHT
Copyright \(co 2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
.br
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/chcon>
.br
or available locally via: info \(aq(coreutils) chcon invocation\(aq