Problem with permissions in wp-content/plugins

Question

I have a WP installation on my local machine and trying to get my hands dirty with plugins. I wish to clone a project from github which has this plugin code. However, i dont have the permissions inside plugins to do this as a normal user without su priveleges. (of course i can become root and do this but i dont think thats the way it should be).

Then by default the folders in a WP installation have group set to "tape", which appears strange to me.

What exactly should be the right permissions for the internal folders on a local WP installation?

Answer 1

Best thing to do is check the WP docs themselves for correct file/folder permissions and how to change them, if needed: http://codex.wordpress.org/Changing_File_Permissions

Typically, all files should be owned by your user (ftp) account on your web server, and should be writable by that account. On shared hosts, files should never be owned by the web server process itself (sometimes this is www, or apache, or nobody user).

Is "tape" a local user name? Or FTP name?

Depending on what kind of system you're using - a local install of apache, php and mysql - or a stack like Bitnami, XAMPP or MAMP, there may be slightly different owners and groups for folders and users.