Re: Gnome SuperUser

[Sean Middleditch <elanthis awesomeplay com>]

On Fri, 2003-01-10 at 11:26, Sriram Ramkrishna wrote:
> This is where I wish we had really nice ACL support in Unix.  
> AFS (http://www.openafs.org) for instance would be a nice where you
> don't have to be root to copy files over you could just get a token
> that would allow such a thing.  I'm still waiting for *ix/*bsd to
> enter the 21st century and get us out of "rwxrwxrwx" world.

Heh.  Yes, real ACL support in Nautilus would be very nice - it would
make using the ACL's on my ext3 partitions rather useful (yay for the
fattr kernel patches!)

There are some libraries about for using acl's, libacl and libattr, I
think you can use those even on file-systems that don't support the real
ACL - I've not looked into it much...

But a good, easy, intuitive, and useful GUI for viewing, changing, and
otherwise playing with ACL's (and heck, even user file attributes) would
be very very nice, on both patched Linux boxes, and the high-end
commercial UNIX's GNOME supposedly supports.  ^,^

> 
> Ah well..
> 
> sri
> 
> On Fri, Jan 10, 2003 at 11:20:43AM -0500, Dan Mann wrote:
> > I tell you what I would like, is the ability to run a nautilus window as
> > root so I can move files back and forth from protected areas like my
> > wife's home directory and my home directory without having to open a
> > terminal, su, than do the copy.  It's really nice when moving things
> > like wallpaper that my wife might like when you have thumbnails to see
> > what you are moving.  I even put certain semi important files in a
> > separate directory from my normal files, and then remove all access so
> > that I don't ever accidentally delete them.  If I do this as root, then
> > I have to go back in with a terminal and change permissions.  And I like
> > the way nautilus handles permissions with a click (I never remember the
> > commands and I always end up doing chmod --help (oh listen to me cry,
> > why when my pappy used to change file permissions he had to do it on a
> > system that's cpu usage was spiked at 100% and was running with 4k, and
> > he had to use a hex editor manually on the disk.  I've got it so easy).
> > 
> > Anyway, I guess my point is that I find these types of situations happen
> > fairly frequently, and being able to do these things from the gui would
> > be nice for me anyhow.
> > 
> > I can't live on windows anymore without the runas command.  Heck, even
> > my dad now has a separate "supervisor" account that can install
> > programs.  That way if something does get run accidentally when he is
> > logged in as a regular user, system files don't go by by.
> > 
> > My .02,
> > 
> > PS - I like the gtk sidebar in redhat phoebe, it looks nice.
> > 
> > dan
> > 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: desktop-devel-list-admin gnome org 
> > > [mailto:desktop-devel-list-admin gnome org] On Behalf Of 
> > > Bastien Nocera
> > > Sent: Friday, January 10, 2003 10:38 AM
> > > To: MArk Finlay
> > > Cc: desktop-devel-list gnome org
> > > Subject: Re: Gnome SuperUser
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Hi,
> > > 
> > > We already talked about that when I ported gnome-sudo to 2.0 and we
> > > pretty much agreed that it was a better idea to depend on pam and
> > > consolehelper rather than on "su-like" programs.
> > > 
> > > Read this thread:
> > > http://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2002-August/
> > > msg00256.html
> > > 
> > > On Fri, 2003-01-10 at 15:22, MArk Finlay wrote:
> > > > There has been some disussion in the past about having a 
> > > kdesu[1] style
> > > > program for Gnome. Every now and then someone comes along 
> > > and says that
> > > > they are going to program one. There has been gnomesu, gsu, 
> > > gtksu, xsu
> > > > and an attempted port of kdesu to gnome[2].
> > > > 
> > > > None of the above projects are being actively maintained and some of
> > > > them cannot even be found online anymore. I know that a lot of users
> > > > want a (gooey)way to run programs as root easily and I had 
> > > some time to
> > > 
> > > If you want gooey ways, try to pour a jam jar on your keyboard, or a
> > > bottle of Coke... Worked for me.
> > > 
> > > > spare so I started looking around for some code to use.
> > > > 
> > > > A week and a half later i bring you Gnome SuperUser: 
> > > http://xsu.sf.net
> > > > As the url implies it is based on xsu and at the moment I 
> > > am using xsu's
> > > > cvs and sf resources for it's development(thanks to xsu's 
> > > author: Philip
> > > > Van Hoof). I found xsu to be unintuitive and excessively 
> > > complicated for
> > > > what it does so i have simplified it and improved the ui. 
> > > You can find
> > > > instructions for checking out the code from sf cvs, and a 
> > > screenshot on
> > > > the site.
> > > > 
> > > > I know that there are a lot of problems with running gtk 
> > > apps as root
> > > > and that it may never be possible to include this sort of 
> > > program in the
> > > > core gnome desktop, but I'd like to think that it has a 
> > > home somewhere
> > > > in the Gnome Software collection, maybe in the fifth toe or hackers'
> > > > toys?
> > > > 
> > > > Anyway, my plans for this tool are to finish off it's UI 
> > > and behavior
> > > > and to try and make it as secure as is possible. I'd love if I could
> > > > continue to hack on it using gnome cvs and bugzilla where it could
> > > > receive scrutiny from better hackers than myself, and maybe 
> > > some i18n
> > > > love etc..
> > > > 
> > > > Also I would like to hear from people on this list the 
> > > resons why a gsu
> > > > program is not wanted in the gnome desktop so that maybe I 
> > > can do some
> > > > research and see if the situation can be improved.
> > > > 
> > > > 
> > > > [1]In case you've never used it it is a little kde program 
> > > that you run
> > > > with the syntax 'kdesu <command>'. It then asks you your 
> > > root password
> > > > ans runs the command as root.
> > > > [2]There is also some code in the gnome-system-tools but 
> > > currently this
> > > > is only used to run those tools as root.
> > > 
> > > Cheers
> > > 
> > > -- 
> > > /Bastien Nocera
> > > http://hadess.net
> > > 
> > > #2  0x4205a2cc in printf ("Oh my %s\n", preferred_deity) from
> > > /lib/i686/libc.so.6 printf ("Oh my %s\n", preferred_deity);
> > > Segmentation fault
> > > 
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > desktop-devel-list mailing list
> > > desktop-devel-list gnome org
> > > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/desktop-devel-list
> > > 
> > _______________________________________________
> > desktop-devel-list mailing list
> > desktop-devel-list gnome org
> > http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/desktop-devel-list
-- 
Sean Middleditch <elanthis awesomeplay com>
AwesomePlay Productions, Inc.