[TriLUG] RH 8.0 desktop root auth. tool

Matt Matthews jvmatthe at math.duke.edu
Thu Jan 2 00:29:02 EST 2003


Hi,

Over the weekend, I helped a friend install RH 8.0 and was right impressed
with the desktop authentication tool that allows a normal user with the root
password to get elevated privileges for a while. If you try to do something
(from the GUI) which would normally require root access, the system first
intervenes before running the app and asks for the root password. If you have
the password, then you get a keyring icon on the taskbar indicating that you
have root access. Then, the app you requested runs. As long as you have the
keys (and I think it might time out after a while), you can continue to run
administration apps without entering the root password.

I thought this was really cool, but don't have access to the system any more
(I'm in NC now and the system is in Georgia) and I really would prefer not to
install RH8.0 just to see how this works. Does anyone have (a) a list of the
RPMs that make this work on Red Hat's system and/or (b) a web page detailing
how this works. I'm running Gentoo and would like to see similar functionality
incorporated into the desktop there.

If they're doing it like I recall the modem dialer on previous versions of Red
Hat, then every app that would require root access was actually a symlink to a
proxy app that would ask for the root password and then start the app with
which the proxy app was initially invoked ($0, I guess?). Is this still the
way it's done? Even if I've got this half right, I'm still looking for
details... :^)

Thanks in advance, even if it is just telling me to suck it up and install RH
8.0 and investigate it on a live system. :^)

Regards,
matt

-- 
Matt Matthews     \ ph: 919.660.2811        \ Use GNU/Linux  _o) w00t
Duke Univ., Postdoc\ jvmatthe at math.duke.edu  \____________   /\\
Dept. of Mathematics\ http://www.math.duke.edu/~jvmatthe/ \ _\_V



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