Index: trunk/Nebulous-Server/lib/Nebulous/Server.pm
===================================================================
--- trunk/Nebulous-Server/lib/Nebulous/Server.pm	(revision 23932)
+++ trunk/Nebulous-Server/lib/Nebulous/Server.pm	(revision 24276)
@@ -15,4 +15,5 @@
 use DBI;
 use Digest::SHA1 qw( sha1_hex );
+use Fcntl ':mode';
 use File::Basename qw( basename dirname fileparse );
 use File::ExtAttr qw( setfattr );
@@ -1576,4 +1577,61 @@
 }
 
+sub chmod_object
+{
+    my $self = shift;
+
+    my ($key, $mode) = validate_pos( @_, 
+        {
+            type        => SCALAR,
+            callbacks   => {
+                'is valid object key' => sub { $self->_is_valid_object_key($_[0]) },
+            },
+        },
+        {
+            type        => SCALAR,
+            regex       => qr/\d{3,4}/,
+            callbacks   => {
+                'is allowable mode' => sub {
+                    $_[0] == (S_IRUSR | S_IRGRP)
+                },
+            },
+        },
+    );
+
+    # ignore volume
+    $key = parse_neb_key($key);
+
+    my $log = $self->log;
+    my $sql = $self->sql;
+    my $db  = $self->db($key);
+
+    $log->debug("entered - @_");
+
+    # find all instances of this object
+    my $locations;
+    eval {
+        $locations = $self->find_instances("$key");
+    };
+    $log->logdie("error: $@") if $@;
+
+    # update each instances
+    foreach my $inst (@$locations) {
+        chmod $mode, URI->new($inst)->path 
+            or $log->logdie("chmod() failed: $!");
+    }
+
+    # stick an xattr on this object with the mode
+    # XXX this would probably be better as a field in the storage_object_attr
+    # table but since we're not planning to use this for very many objects (as
+    # a %) it may not be worth adding the extra field at this time.
+    eval {
+        $self->setxattr_object("$key", 'user.mode', $mode, 'replace');
+    };
+    $log->logdie("error: $@") if $@;
+
+    $log->debug("leaving");
+
+    return $mode;
+}
 
 sub _get_storage_volume