chguard

chguard is a safety-first command-line tool that snapshots and restores filesystem ownership and permissions.

Think of it as a guardrail around chmod and chown: it records the current state, shows you exactly what would change, and only applies changes after explicit confirmation.

Features

Snapshots ownership and permissions

Records numeric uid, gid, and file mode for files, directories, and symbolic links.

Preview before restore

Always shows a clear, readable table of differences before applying changes. Missing paths and type mismatches are shown as skipped items because restore does not create, delete, or replace files.

Interactive confirmation

A single confirmation prompt at the end of a restore (default: No).

Dry-run mode

Preview restore operations without prompting or applying changes.

Wrapper mode (automatic snapshots)

chguard can also run as a wrapper around ownership and permission commands. In this mode, chguard automatically saves a snapshot before the command runs, so the user can easily restore the previous state if needed.

Supported commands

Wrapper mode is intentionally limited to commands that modify filesystem metadata only:

• chown
• chmod
• chgrp

Other commands are rejected to avoid giving a false sense of protection.

Automatic snapshot names

Snapshots created in wrapper mode are named automatically, for example:

auto-20251230-161301

Auto-generated snapshots are visually distinguished in the output so they are easy to identify.

Scope control

Restore:

• both ownership and permissions (default)
• permissions only
• ownership only

Safe by design

• Never creates, deletes, or moves files
• Missing files are ignored
• New files are ignored
• Symbolic links are handled without following their targets
• Requires sudo only when necessary

Non-Goals

chguard deliberately does not:

• restore deleted files
• remove newly created files
• track file contents or checksums
• manage ACLs or extended attributes
• provide full “undo” semantics

It only concerns itself with ownership and permissions.

Installation

From GuardUtils package repo

This is the preferred method of installation.

Debian/Ubuntu

1) Import the GPG key

sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/guardutils.gpg

The GPG fingerprint is 0032C71FA6A11EF9567D4434C5C06BD4603C28B1.

2) Add the APT source

echo "deb [arch=amd64 signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/guardutils.gpg] https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/debian stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/guardutils.list

3) Update and install

sudo apt update
sudo apt install chguard

Fedora/RHEL

1) Import the GPG key

sudo rpm --import https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg

2) Add the repository configuration

sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/guardutils.repo > /dev/null << 'EOF'
[guardutils]
name=GuardUtils Repository
baseurl=https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/rpm/$basearch
enabled=1
gpgcheck=1
repo_gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://repo.sysmd.uk/guardutils/guardutils.gpg
EOF

4) Update and install

sudo dnf upgrade --refresh
sudo dnf install chguard

From PyPI

pip install chguard

From this repository

git clone https://git.sysmd.uk/guardutils/chguard.git
cd chguard/
poetry install

This installs the chguard CLI into the Poetry environment.

Usage

Save a state

chguard --save /srv/app --name app-baseline

If the path contains root-owned files, saving requires sudo.

List saved states

chguard --list

Example output:

app-baseline   /srv/app   2025-12-20 18:11:08 +00:00

Restore a state (preview only)

chguard --restore app-baseline

This shows a table of ownership and permission differences. Missing paths and type mismatches are reported as skipped items.

Restore with confirmation

chguard --restore app-baseline

You will be prompted:

Do you want to restore this state? (y/N)

The default answer is No.

Dry-run

chguard --restore app-baseline --dry-run

Restore only permissions or only ownership

chguard --restore app-baseline --permissions
chguard --restore app-baseline --owner

Remove old states

chguard --prune-states

This removes states older than the number of days set in CHGUARD_STATES_LIFE

Remove states older than N days

chguard --prune-states=14

This removes all states older than 14 days.

Remove all states

chguard --prune-states=all

Environment Variable

CHGUARD_STATES_LIFEcontrols the default number of days to keep when using chguard --prune-states.

Wrapper mode

Use -- to separate chguard arguments from the wrapped command:

chguard -- chown user:group file
chguard -- chmod 755 file
chguard -- chgrp staff file

Privilege model

chguard never escalates privileges automatically

• Saving fails if root-owned files are present and the user is not root
• Restoring fails if changes require elevated privileges
• Preview and dry-run operations never require sudo

Storage

Snapshots are stored in a local SQLite database containing:

• relative path
• file type (file, directory, or symbolic link)
• numeric uid / gid
• numeric mode

Usernames and permission strings are resolved only for display.

TAB completion

Add this to your .bashrc

eval "$(register-python-argcomplete chguard)"

And then

source ~/.bashrc

pre-commit

This project uses pre-commit to run automatic formatting and security checks before each commit (Black, Bandit, and various safety checks).

To enable it:

poetry install
poetry run pre-commit install

This ensures consistent formatting, catches common issues early, and keeps the codebase clean.

Tests

Run the pytest suite with:

poetry run pytest

Support

If you find chguard useful, consider supporting its development: