[ubuntu-us-ut] Ubuntu's default groups

Christer Edwards christer.edwards at gmail.com
Thu Dec 3 22:39:12 GMT 2009


> I guess I'm asking this: what is the technical reason for putting the
> default user into several groups, when it provides no apparent technical
> advantages, and could mean a nightmare of a challenge should he lose
> being a member of a group? Why is this implemented?

If the users are put into the widest range of groups to begin with
there shouldn't be any reason why they'd be running usermod -G and
screwing things up. Also, group membership is important for access to
the hardware. On my Arch machine I forgot to put myself into the audio
and optical group and couldn't use my CD drive or listen to audio.

Ubuntu wants to make sure that users aren't required to add to
groups--if its not expected on Windows, it shouldn't be expected on
Ubuntu. I don't know that that is the official ideal, but it seems the
market they are shooting for.

If you want stuff to "just work" and not require any manual
configuration, use Ubuntu. If you want a stripped, strict
UNIX-standard system maybe Ubuntu isn't the right answer for your
system.



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