rescue disk,etc.

[Art Alexion]

Derek Broughton wrote:

>scott wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Alfred Vidrio wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>The new old guy has 2 questions:
>>>1. Where can I get a good rescue disk for Kubuntu?
>>>      
>>>
>>I have never used any, but I did a quick search in synaptic and it came
>>up with a program called mondo.  It may be what you are looking for, I
>>have never used it myself.
>>    
>>
>
>Isn't the Kubuntu _install_ disk a rescue disk?  (I came within a hair of
>having to find that out today, when dist-upgrade left me with a completely
>unusable system after trying to upgrade libc6-i686).
>
>  
>
>>>2. What is the difference between kdesu and sudo command.
>>>      
>>>
>
>  
>
>>"NEVER use sudo to start graphical programs. You should always use
>>gksudo or kdesu to run such programs, otherwise new login attempts may
>>fail..".  You can find the rest of the text at
>>https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RootSudo?highlight=%28kdesu%29
>>    
>>
>
>kdesu is different - I've often found sudo completely incapable of starting
>a graphical program.  otoh, I'd never use kdesu to start a text-mode
>program. 
>
>  
>
sudo and kdesu/gksudo have different purposes.  If you plan to run a
script or terminal mode program as superuser, use sudo.  It runs the
script/program in the terminal where you launched the command, and the
terminal remains unusable as such until the script/program running in it
has finished (there is a way to background a program once it is running
in the foreground, but that is another issue).  Therefore, if you use
sudo to run a graphical program (for instance 'sudo kate')  you will not
be able to use that terminal to do anything else until kate closes.  So,
you might say, I can run kate in the background using 'sudo kate &' to
solve that problem.  In fact that causes problems.  'sudo kate &' also
backgrounds the password request and nothing visible happens because
sudo is waiting for the password, but you can't enter it because you
can't get to the prompt.

kdesu (in kde) and gksudo (in gnome) solves this dilemma.  kdesu is
itself a graphical program that has a very simple job.  It provides a
password prompt in a graphical dialog -- outside the terminal -- and if
it gets a correct password, it runs the program in superuser mode. 
That's it.  To effectively use kdesu, you would run it thus: 'kdesu kate
&' (You should also be able to run 'kdesu kate' because, kdesu exits
after it launches kate and thereby returns control of the terminal to you.

Out of the box (with hoary, at least), bash_completion does not work
with kdesu (although it does with gksudo).  I don't know if this has
been fixed since then, as I fixed it myself manually.  If yours doesn't
work, I suggest you search the archives with the terms 'kdesu &
bash_completion'.

-- 

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Art Alexion
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