[spyro187]

Is there program where I can type a list of folder into it or a config and once that is done anything in the folder can go down into the tree structure but not any higher?

[horndude]

sure, change ownership of top directory and make it different than the user that will be using the directory below:
example:
root owns /home/test
user owns /home/test/*-------user cant go higher than /home/test........make sure read,write,and exec for /home/test is turned off for the user in question

use chown to do that
use chmod to change the rwx(read write exec) privileges if you want even more control

[spyro187]

Ok that is the way I had it configured which keeps my main files safe. Here is the main issue. When I let someone host at www.site.com/username they can use php to go into someone else folder www.site.com/username2. I chown all subdirs so they can't go up but they can still go laterally. I give them all accounts because then my server would have to many individual accounts on it. Any Idea?

[horndude]

I think individual accounts is the only way to go, but im not a php expert by any stretch.

[spyro187]

thats what i was afraid of. Is there a good way to make virtual users with local file permissions? The problem with local users is that if I get a high number of users it will be hard to distibute load.

[horndude]

dont know to be honest

I do know this, web servers using php often have to deal with huge loads, hence most have lots of RAM and multiple CPU's. I would think a relatively speedy desktop PC could handle quite bit though.