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On Python, I was wondering if there was a simple way to create a text file which can't be edited by the user and can only be edited once, by the computer.

I want to use this so that I can make a User ID for a user that cannot be changed. Does anyone have a solution?

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    The user can't edit? Sure, use chmod and chown given that the user does not have administrator / root privileges, he should not be able to edit if you set the right permissions. The system can't edit? Well, a root user / system, will always be able to change / modify the file, but if it will, depends. Commented Mar 19, 2017 at 10:15
  • Also, since you only want to generate an ID, given that you have the username, you could just MD5 or a SHA hash. Commented Mar 19, 2017 at 10:17
  • I just want the simplest way possible. All I need is for it to write the ID to a file and then "lock" the file. Commented Mar 19, 2017 at 10:19
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    No, there isn't. You cannot trust the user's computer. If it's important, store it on your server. Commented Mar 19, 2017 at 10:19
  • Possible duplicate of Changing file permission in python Commented Mar 19, 2017 at 10:20

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If there is any security reason why the UserID shouldn't be changed then you need to store the information on your own server. If you don't want it to be easy, but don't mind it being possible, then you could either change the file permission on the file, encrypt the file in some way so that it's not easy to edit by the user, or hide it by prefixing the name with a . so that it doesn't automatically appear in the explorer window.

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Thanks a lot! I was thinking about some of those options before but thanks for some of the other suggestions.

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