On Thu, 31 Jul 2003, Felix Miata wrote: > Bill Mullen wrote: > > > I hate to bring up something that's been rehashed over and over again > > in so many forums, but I must ask, why do you feel any need at *all* > > to log into a full-blown X session as root? I have /never/ needed to > > do this (I'm not saying I've never done it, just that in retrospect > > I've never *needed* to, and I haven't done so for a very long time > > now). Frankly I just don't understand how this can ever be neccessary, > > or even all that helpful, to anyone; the risks, OTOH, are considerable > > and, to my way of thinking, are entirely and easily avoidable merely > > by never doing that. > > > Enlighten me, would you? :) > > I don't do it often, but the usual reason is not remembering or not > being able to figure out how to do some kind of configuration in bash > that Mandrake provides GUI tools to do easily. I've never figured out > the ramifications of doing su in a normal login to do such things, so I > just don't.
Since you can run any program on the system from the command line when "su-ed" to root, including all the GUI ones like Mandrake Control Center (which is "/usr/sbin/drakconf", BTW), I still don't see the need. The only "ramification" of using su in an xterm to become root is that any program you run from that shell thereafter is run as root; the rest of your desktop is running as your logged-in user, and is unaffected. If I were in the mood to worry about unknown ramifications, I would be worrying about the unknown (to you, as yet) ramifications of running an X session as root, were I you. :) The first rule of thumb on any Linux or *nix-based system is, "Do as root only that absolute bare minimum that /must/ be done as root." -- Bill Mullen [EMAIL PROTECTED] MA, USA RLU #270075 MDK 8.1 & 9.0 "There are two kinds of people in the world, those who believe there are two kinds of people in the world and those who don't." - Robert Benchley
Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
