4.1. Mac OS File Permissions: A Brief History of Time
For many Mac users, the concept of file system permissions is both relatively new and oft misunderstood. First introduced in OS X, file system permissions were a drastic departure from Mac OS 9's largely unprotected system, a trait revealing of the system's single-user nature.
With OS X came a true multiuser OS born of Unix roots and, as such, a POSIX compliant (Portable Operating System Interface) file system permissions implementation. If you're scratching your head right now, don't worry; the term POSIX simply refers to a series of standards covering a number of OS conventions, of which most relevant to this chapter are those covering file system permissions. Outside of Windows, the POSIX ...
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