HP-UX

What about /var ? is it:
drwxr-xr-x 23 bin bin 1024 Apr 12 2005 var
os:/var $ ll|more
total 28
-rw-r--r-- 1 12929 users 66 Dec 12 1995 OITAPE.TID
drwxrwxrwx 2 root sys 96 Dec 9 2003 PSS
drwxr-xr-x 3 bin bin 96 May 1 1999 X11
drwxr-xr-x 14 adm adm 1024 May 7 2007 adm
drwxr-xr-x 4 root sys 1024 Jun 13 2007 dt
drwxrwxr-x 2 root sys 1024 Apr 12 2005 lost+found
drwxrwxr-x 2 bin mail 1024 Oct 1 2007 mail
lrwxr-xr-x 1 root sys 8 Apr 7 2005 ncs -> /etc/ncs
drwxrwxrwx 2 bin bin 96 Mar 5 1997 news
dr-xr-xr-x 17 bin bin 1024 Jun 18 1999 opt
drwxrwxrwx 2 bin bin 96 Mar 5 1997 ppl
drwxrwxrwx 2 bin bin 1024 Mar 28 2006 preserve
drwxrwxrwx 2 bin bin 96 Mar 5 1997 rbootd
dr-xr-xr-x 3 bin bin 96 Dec 14 2005 run
dr-xr-xr-x 8 bin bin 1024 Mar 31 18:07 sam
dr-xr-xr-x 16 bin bin 1024 Dec 1 2006 spool
drwxr-xr-x 4 root sys 96 Mar 5 1997 statmon
drwxrwxrwx 5 root other 96 May 1 1999 stm
drwxrwxrwx 5 bin bin 2048 Apr 11 17:18 tmp
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 2048 Dec 14 2005 tombstones
dr-xr-xr-x 6 bin bin 96 Mar 5 1997 uucp
drwxr-xr-x 2 root sys 96 May 22 2006 vue
drwxr-xr-x 3 root sys 1024 Mar 5 1997 yp

This isn't about changing the permissions on things that you mount. Databases often use raw unmounted space. If you mount all of your disk volumes, then this won't apply to you.

i have 2 DB. prod & test

i can access things with no issues in test, but some things are not accessible in prod-items where informix seems to be needing to creating temp files.

my guess somehow permissions are not correct somewhere. I can access data through INformix SQL and some forms, but not others. programs that are being accessed the permissions are accurate, so again, it must be the temp space.