Re: Thoughts & suggestions

[Sean Middleditch <sean middleditch iname com>]

> > (8) There should be a way for gnome apps that ideally require root access
> > to request the root password in a simple popup dialog which contains
> > a field to enter the root password or run the app as non-root. That way
> > we won't have to manually su to root and run the app. Programs that this
> > would be useful for or GnoRPM, Update Agent, Disk Management Tool, etc.
>
> This was happening at one stage.  It would make GnoRPM so much more useful
> than it already is.

I don't know how many UNIX/Linux implementations have this, but RedHat has
this nifty way of running commands as root.  If a program in /usr/bin is
really just a sym-link to a /bin/consolehelper, that program is run, it checks

what command line was used to run it, looks up the info on that name in a
special config file directory, finds out the authorization settings, and then
asks for the password of whichever user is allowed to run the program (if it
isn't one of those users running the command).  If X is running, a GTK dialog
pops up, and if not, a line in the console asks.  If the password is correct
(check by PAM, of course, with special configs for each program setup to use
consolehelper), the real program (usually located in /usr/sbin or somesuch) is

run.

I'm not totally sure, but this is why you get all those RedHat users complain
about GNOME asking for thier password when they logout, right?  reboot and
halt commands are both symlinks in /usr/bin to consolehelper, and all that.

My POINT would be, GNOME could modify the consolehelper code and embed it
right into gnome-core, no?  In a desktop entry, a users options could be
added, with the names of all the users who can run the file.  And a mainuser
or defaultuser or something could be added, so that if a user not listed in
users tries to run the program from the .desktop entry, a dialog pops up
asking for the password of defaultuser, and then runs the program if the
password is correct.

Sean Middleditch
Etc.