Abstract: A method and apparatus for changing an attribute such as the owner or mode of a file system object such as a file or directory in an information handling system. In response to receiving a user command to change the value of the attribute to a new value, the existing value of the attribute is saved and the value of the attribute is then changed to the new value. The user may later use the saved value to restore the value of the attribute to a previous value. The existing value is saved in a temporary directory allocated to the user, from which it is deleted upon the lapse of a predetermined time period. The time period is settable by the user or set to a default value if it is not set by the user. The user may specify a subset of file system objects whose attributes are saved.