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Bug 153399 - doing root stuff as normal user without shell or any obscure methods - increasing usability with just a text box
doing root stuff as normal user without shell or any obscure methods - increa...
Status: RESOLVED INVALID
Product: gnome-desktop
Classification: Core
Component: general
unspecified
Other All
: High normal
: ---
Assigned To: Desktop Maintainers
Desktop Maintainers
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
 
Reported: 2004-09-22 09:43 UTC by Power PC
Modified: 2004-12-22 21:47 UTC
See Also:
GNOME target: ---
GNOME version: ---



Description Power PC 2004-09-22 09:43:44 UTC
In mandrake/redhat when accessing control panel as a normal user, it ask for
root password to continue. 

This feature should be implemented all over gnome desktop. if a user doesnt have
permission to do a tasks (copy, del, rename files, open a movie, play mp3,
browser a folder...) rather than giving a message that "not enough
permissions..." it should provide a text box to enter root password so that the
operation can be continued without having to repeat it again from root/sudo account.

 

Other information:
I hope developers implement this feature all over gnome - so say if i have a
movie saved as /mnt/disk1/movies/matrix.avi and the disk was mounted as root
previously. Current behavior is as a normal user if I open totem movie player
and browse to the path and open the movie - I get a error saying "not enough
permissions". I therefore suggest that this behaviour can be modified to say a
text box asking for root password to continue. If the authentication is
successfull - the movie plays !
Comment 1 Sitsofe Wheeler 2004-09-22 10:01:48 UTC
I think this is an unwise idea. Sometimes having root won't solve the problem
(e.g. being root won't let you access protected network shares) and you also
bump up the risk of the user damaging something by accident - e.g. the user
tries to move /usr/lib/gcc-lib/ to their home directory, is prompted and then
breaks various things. It also opens up a can of worms with regard to
permissions too.

You shouldn't be moving user things around as root. If you have to, then it
suggests the orginal set up of your system was wrong (e.g. your disk was mounted
with poorly chosen parameters).
Comment 2 Power PC 2004-09-22 10:41:16 UTC
Mandrake control panel has options to del/create disk partitions and a normal
user can do that with root password :) To some extent I agree with your view.
People sometimes can accidently/unknowingly do some really stupid things ;) Can
this idea be reviewed by the Gnome HIG team if possible ?
Comment 3 Power PC 2004-09-22 10:52:24 UTC
On second thought, this feature can be implemented and made optional. A gconf
setting (or something similar) allows to turn this feature on/off. It should be
left to the distribution or user to decide whether they need to use this option
or not. default can be set to off. Just a thought.
Comment 4 Elijah Newren 2004-09-23 02:13:50 UTC
Hi,

Bugzilla is mainly for tracking requests and bugs about a certain component or
product.  You are asking for something gnome-wide.  In particular, this doesn't
belong in the gnome-desktop product (which is a narrowly defined library, not
"general Gnome stuff").  I could move it to the "general" product which was
created for more system-wide stuff, but there is no maintainer for that product
so your report would never get seen.  The only way to really track this in
bugzilla would be to open bugs against every product that needs to implement
this.  But I that would be very bad unless you *first* got the community to
agree to such an idea.  I suggest that if you really think this is a good idea
(personally, I agree with Sitsofe), then bring it up on the desktop-devel-list
mailing list.  I'm going to resolve this bug as invalid, but if you don't like
that you can reopen and reassign to the general product--just understand that
there won't be anyone to see it.

Hope that helps...
Comment 5 Power PC 2004-09-23 04:21:23 UTC
ya thanks. i think that will be the best option for this to get resolved :)