php fopen ftp_get changing owner/group - sometimes - why?

Question

On my php host, I have a script that is run by a cron job that opens/overwrites a file from a remote ftp server. It works most of the time, but I am finding that when it initially creates the file, the owner/group are "736/736", but at some point the owner and group change to "99/99". Problem is I start running in to permissions issues - here is the code:

$local = fopen("/mypath/myfile.txt","w");
$result = ftp_fget($conn_id, $local,"remotepath/remotefile.txt", FTP_BINARY);
fclose($local);

I am using this same code to pull down a bunch of files. It does not happen to all the files. This original file is never touched again, except for a 'read' type fopen ("r").

I do not think it is the ftp_fget, as I have a different script, also run by cron that creates text files via an fopen "w", and SOME of those files are also owner "99/99".

Any thoughts? Could this be a config problem on the isp's side? If so, what do I tell them? When I tell them my owner/group are wrong, they totally reset my entire ftp directory - permissions,owner, etc. which is a pain.

Answer 1

The Group UID 99 and Owner UID 99 is Nobody or apache. This is the same for all folders created by the file system. So, when cron job runs, the files are owned by apache.

Solutions:

1. You can ask your webhosting provider to fix these things.
2. Convert all files that it's going to read/write to 777. If files are 777, it usually does not try to change permission. However, if new files are created, they will again be owner by 99.