"mkdir -p" new child dirs don't inherit default POSIX ACLs properly

[C. J. Meidlinger]

Greetings,

This is different than Bug#19546 which requested inheritance of ACLs on
existing parent dirs.  This problem report is for newly created child
directories with "mkdir -p".

I discovered this on OpenSuse 10.2 PPC (coreutils-6.4-10, pSeries arch)
and confirmed it on Slackware 12.0 and Slackware-current (coreutils-6.9,
x86 arch).

The coreutils package in Slackware 11.0 (coreutils-5.97, x86 arch) appears
to be ok.

The problem is that directories created by "mkdir -p" do not inherit
default POSIX ACLs properly whereas those created with "mkdir" do.  On a
file system mounted with the "acl" option, and with POSIX ACLs enabled in
the Linux kernel, I can demonstrate the different behavior with the
following:

1)  Create the test directory to hold the default ACL:

     # mkdir acl-test

2)  Flush all inherited ACLs in case you have other things going on in
this work space:

     # setfacl -R -b acl-test

3)  Add a default ACL that gives a group rwx access to new directories:

     # setfacl -d -m g:video:rwx acl-test

4)  View default ACL:

     # getfacl acl-test
     # file: acl-test
     # owner: root
     # group: root
     user::rwx
     group::r-x
     other::r-x
     default:user::rwx
     default:group::r-x
     default:group:video:rwx
     default:mask::rwx
     default:other::r-x

5)  Create directories with "mkdir" and "mkdir -p":

     # mkdir acl-test/mkdir
     # mkdir -p acl-test/mkdir-p

6)  View inherited ACLs:

     # getfacl acl-test/*
     # file: acl-test/mkdir
     # owner: root
     # group: root
     user::rwx
     group::r-x
     group:video:rwx
     mask::rwx
     other::r-x
     default:user::rwx
     default:group::r-x
     default:group:video:rwx
     default:mask::rwx
     default:other::r-x

     # file: acl-test/mkdir-p
     # owner: root
     # group: root
     user::rwx
     group::r-x
     group:video:rwx                 #effective:r-x
     mask::r-x
     other::r-x
     default:user::rwx
     default:group::r-x
     default:group:video:rwx
     default:mask::rwx
     default:other::r-x

The key difference is the "mask" entry in the seventh line of output for
each directory -- "rwx" for "mkdir" and "r-x" for "mkdir-p".  The altered
mask gives us an effective permission set for the video group of "r-x" on
the "mkdir-p" directory instead of the "rwx" that we specified in the
default ACL for the parent directory.

"mkdir $dirname" and "mkdir -p $dirname" shouldn't have different ACL
inheritance behaviors for the newly created child directories, should
they?

Thanks,

CJM