STICKY(7)              Miscellaneous Information Manual              STICKY(7)

NAME
     sticky – sticky text and append-only directories

DESCRIPTION
     A special file mode, called the sticky bit (mode S_ISVTX), is used to
     indicate special treatment for directories.  It is ignored for regular
     files.  See chmod(2) or the file <sys/stat.h> for an explanation of file
     modes.

STICKY DIRECTORIES
     A directory whose `sticky bit' is set becomes an append-only directory,
     or, more accurately, a directory in which the deletion of files is
     restricted.  A file in a sticky directory may only be removed or renamed
     by a user if the user has write permission for the directory and the user
     is the owner of the file, the owner of the directory, or the super-user.
     This feature is usefully applied to directories such as /tmp which must
     be publicly writable but should deny users the license to arbitrarily
     delete or rename each others' files.

     Any user may create a sticky directory.  See chmod(1) for details about
     modifying file modes.

HISTORY
     A sticky command appeared in Version 7 AT&T UNIX/32V.

BUGS
     Neither open(2) nor mkdir(2) will create a file with the sticky bit set.

macOS 15.2                       June 5, 1993                       macOS 15.2