Gregory Heytings writes: >> >> How one convert the output of (nth 8 (file-attributes "/home/user")) >> to numeric mode? >> > > (file-modes "/home/user") Yes, thanks I know this one, what I want to convert is e.g. "-rwxr-x---" to number. (file-modes-number-to-symbolic #o750) "-rwxr-x---" Means "-|rwx|r-x|---" rwx for user, rx for group and nothing for others. What I mean is that file-modes-symbolic-to-number returns the right value with MODES "u=rwx,g=rx,o=" but the wrong value with "u=rwx,g=r-x,o=---". This is why read-file-modes remove the "-" for passing the string as MODES to file-modes-symbolic-to-number. So shouldn't file-modes-symbolic-to-number supports "u=rwx,g=r-x,o=---" and "u=rwx,g=rx,o=" in the same way. I ask because I had to read code to understand this as I can't understand the docstring. -- Thierry