A Utility For Dumping ACLs

Managing NTFS permissions on a large number of computers can be difficult, and administrators can easily get lost in the vast amount of information. But don't give up. There's a tool available, and it's easy to use.

DumpSec, by SomarSoft, is a utility designed to dump security settings into a file or on a screen. Although the program is accessed by its GUI or from the command line, try beginning with the GUI to explore the functionality that the utility provides. For example, to dump all the permissions defined on a folder, its subfolders, and files, go to Report | Dump Permissions For File System.

The Report menu offers several other options, including dumping permissions for the registry, printers, and shares, and allows the dumping of all users and groups, policy settings, rights, and services. Once you have the needed information, save it to a file or search for additional information.

If you want to script and automate your tasks, try using the utility from the command line. The same reports are generated as through the GUI. The following command dumps the security permissions on all folders on the D drive.

Dumpsec /rpt=dir=d:\ /saveas=csv /outfile=c:\data\out.txt The /rpt=dir=d:\ tells DumpSec to dump the security permissions of the folders, subfolders, and files on the D drive. The /outfile=c:\data\out.txt options specifies the file that will hold the output of the utility.

The /saveas=csv option instructs the utility to create the output file with values separated by commas. If this option is not specified, DumpSec will create the output file in a utility-specific DCL format. So if you need to read the output file or process it with another tool, make sure you specify this option.

You can download the free DumpSec utility from SomarSoft's Web site. For additional command line options, refer to the utility's online Help. http://www.somarsoft.com/

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