Re: GNOME System Monitor will use libgnomesu

[Mike Hearn <mike navi cx>]

On Sun, 09 Jan 2005 11:43:58 +0000, Mark McLoughlin wrote:
>    - I worry that the addition libgnomesu-like API to the desktop will
>      lead to the UI being littered (in unpredictable places) with root
>      password dialogs e.g.
> 
>        - "Open as root" in Nautilus context menus - "Run as root" in the
>        run dialog
>        - Random features in apps asking for root like the "renice" and
>          "kill" features in gnome-system-monitor
> 
>      What a horrible thought.

Well ... why is this horrible? I don't see how that would be any less
predictable than "this app needs to be/can be run as root" dialogs popping
up all over the place especially as given that type of dialog you have no
way to know whether you'll actually need the root password or not for the
particular task you have in mind.

I still think one of the best UIs for this is the Mac UI where you can see
settings but the widgets are disabled and you can't edit them until you
click the lock icon. That's easiest to implement with something like DBUS
used to talk to a higher privileged child process run via a libgnomesu
type API.

The other thing is that a usermode style API does make "run as root"/"open
as root" features harder to implement. I don't understand why those
features are bad, it's a common enough task and right now the only way to
do it is to use the command line, eg there is no way to browse another
users home directory using the UI even though in a family situation that
sort of thing is very common.

thanks -mike