The permissions on new files and directories are normally governed by create mask, directory mask, force create mode and force directory mode but the boolean inherit permissions parameter overrides this. New directories inherit the mode of the parent directory, including bits such as setgid. New files inherit their read/write bits from the parent directory. Their execute bits continue to be determined by map archive , map hidden and map system as usual. Note that the setuid bit is never set via inheritance (the code explicitly prohibits this). This can be particularly useful on large systems with many users, perhaps several thousand, to allow a single [homes] share to be used flexibly by each user. create mask directory mask force create mode force directory mode no