# Logstash complains permission denied when the file is owned by logstash user

**URL:** <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870>\
**Category:** Logstash\
**Created:** [March 9, 2016, 7:24am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870 "2016-03-09T07:24:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![teewhey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8797f3/32.png) [@teewhey](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/teewhey)\
**Post date:** [March 9, 2016, 7:24am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870/1 "2016-03-09T07:24:40Z")

</div>

I keep on getting this in the logstash log where Logstash complains saying unable to open the file (permission denied), but the file actually is set to belong the logstash user.

Any idea why?

```
root@PROD-logger-10-2-200-87:/var/log/logstash# tail -n1 logstash.log
{:timestamp=>"2016-03-09T07:18:30.794000+0000", :message=>"failed to open /log/app/applog-today.log: Permission denied - /log/app/applog-today.log", :level=>:warn}

root@PROD-logger-10-2-200-87:/var/log/logstash# ll /log/app/applog-today.log
-rwxrwxrwx 1 logstash logstash 23374 Mar 9 06:16 /log/app/applog-today.log
```

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![magnusbaeck](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/user_avatar/discuss.elastic.co/magnusbaeck/32/44943_2.png) [@magnusbaeck](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/magnusbaeck)\
**Post date:** [March 9, 2016, 7:32am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870/2 "2016-03-09T07:32:07Z")

</div>

Check the permissions of the /log and /log/app directories. The Logstash users needs at least execute permission for those.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![teewhey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8797f3/32.png) [@teewhey](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/teewhey)\
**Post date:** [March 9, 2016, 9:22am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870/3 "2016-03-09T09:22:57Z")

</div>

It does... I have recursively changed to 777 for the whole folder.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\
**Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 5:07am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/logstash-complains-permission-denied-when-the-file-is-owned-by-logstash-user/43870/4 "2017-07-06T05:07:49Z")

</div>