Password question.

[Paul Rumelhart]

Knapp wrote:
> Your system has a file:
> /etc/sudoers
>
> If you add this line to it, then you can change how long you stay
> signed into sudo. The default is 5 min. I am sure you have seen how
> sudo only asks for a password after you have stopped using it for a
> bit. I think this is the right command to make that 300 min (5 hours)
> but please wait to make sure someone else agrees with me!
>
> Defaults timestamp_timeout=300
>
>
>
>
>
> >From sudoers man page:
> timestamp_timeout
>
> Number of minutes that can elapse before sudo will ask for a passwd
> again. The default is 5. Set this to 0 to always prompt for a
> password. If set to a value less than 0 the user's timestamp will
> never expire. This can be used to allow users to create or delete
> their own timestamps via sudo -v and sudo -k respectively.
>   


I tried the above, and it worked fine.  A comment in the sudoers file 
suggested I use the visudo command, which I did.  I entered the defaults 
command just the way you had it typed.  Apparently the visudo command 
also does a syntax check on the file as an added bonus.

I just tried to run sudo after waiting ten minutes, and it still let me 
run it without authenticating.  Presumably, in five hours I'll have to 
type another one.  I'll probably change this to be a smaller value later.

Paul