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• When "hive.warehouse.subdir.inherit.perms" flag is enabled in Hive, Hive will try to do all the following inheritances.
  • Database directory inherits from warehouse directory.
  • Table directory inherits from database directory, or from warehouse directory if it is part of the default database.
  • External table directory inherits from parent directory.
  • Partition directory inherits from table directory.  (As of Hive 0.15.)
  • Data files inherits inherit from table or partition directory.
• Failure by Hive to inherit will not cause operation to fail. Rule of thumb of when security-prop inheritance will happen is the following:
  • To run chmod, a user must be the owner of the file, or else a super-user.
  • To run chgrp, a user must be the owner of files, or else a super-user.
  • Hence, user that hive runs as (either 'hive' or the logged-in user in case of impersonation), must be super-user or owner of the file whose security properties are going to be changed

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