YAMAMOTO Takashi <yamt@netbsd.org> writes:
   > chown user.group -> chown user:group
   > 
   > according to cvs log of basesrc/etc/etc.sun3/ttyaction and
   > archive of source-changes, it was backed out with MAKEDEV
   > because of portability issue.
   > but i think ttyaction doesn't have that issue as it's never
   > executed on non-NetBSD environment.
   
   In general, user:group is the portable construct. user.group is not
   portable.


depends on how you define "portable".  most older systems won't accept
user:group, and some of older systems also won't accept user.group.

the only truly portable solution is to manually all chown/chgrp.

user:group is however the "standard" way, so probably is most portable
to modern systems.


.mrg.