By default, Berkeley DB does not create intermediate directories needed for recovery, that is, if the file /a/b/c/mydatabase is being recovered, and the directory path b/c does not exist, recovery will fail. This default behavior is because Berkeley DB does not know what permissions are appropriate for intermediate directory creation, and creating the directory might result in a security problem.

Directory permissions are interpreted as a string of nine characters, using the character set r (read), w (write), x (execute or search), and - (none). The first character is the read permissions for the directory owner (set to either r or -). The second character is the write permissions for the directory owner (set to either w or -). The third character is the execute permissions for the directory owner (set to either x or -).

Similarly, the second set of three characters are the read, write and execute/search permissions for the directory group, and the third set of three characters are the read, write and execute/search permissions for all others. For example, the string rwx------ would configure read, write and execute/search access for the owner only. The string rwxrwx--- would configure read, write and execute/search access for both the owner and the group. The string rwxr----- would configure read, write and execute/search access for the directory owner and read-only access for the directory group.