sudo vs. gksu

Tony Arnold tony.arnold at manchester.ac.uk
Sat Apr 5 10:18:57 UTC 2008


Markus,

Markus Schönhaber wrote:
> Mario Vukelic wrote:
> 
>> No, gksu _is the right tool to use. sudo should never be used to start
>> graphical applications, as this could cause problems:
>>
>> https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RootSudo (in the "Notes" section)
> 
> Since the above page only says "don't do it!" but doesn't explain what
> might happen otherwise: what problems are to be expected if one starts a
> graphical application with sudo?

I don't think there is any difference. gksudo is just a graphical
front-end to sudo. Both end up running the application as root and thus
have all the access that root has. Users should only do this if they
really need such access.

Regards,
Tony.
-- 
Tony Arnold, IT Security Coordinator, University of Manchester,
IT Services Division, Kilburn Building, Oxford Road, Manchester M13 9PL.
T: +44 (0)161 275 6093, F: +44 (0)870 136 1004, M: +44 (0)773 330 0039
E: tony.arnold at manchester.ac.uk, H: http://www.man.ac.uk/Tony.Arnold




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