How to make pkexec applications use root password?

[Recy]

I compared to a regular debian install. On there, sudo is not enabled, by default, and the root password is used for all root access prompts, including pkexec. How can I set this debian behavior on solydxk?

[Arjen Balfoort]

I don't know if understand what you mean, but I'll do an educated guess.

The first user's password is also used as the root's password during installation.
You can change the root's password with:

Code: Select all

su
passwd

The first user is also added to the sudo group during installation.
If you don't want that user to be able to sudo, simply remove that user from the sudo group with either kuser (SolydK) or usermanager (SolydX).

[Recy]

No. I am talking about pkexec, which is different from sudo. By default, things like gparted and synaptic use pkexec. So, even if you remove sudo, or set it to use the root password, pkexec is still configured to use the user password. This is not the default behavior of debian, which uses root password for everything, and no sudo. I can experiment by totally disabling sudo, but I don't want to break it.

[kurotsugi]

debian disabled root password by default so solydxk should have exact same behaviour with vanilla debian. all authority management is done systemd so there should no different whether if you use root or current user credentials. it's a rough guess but I think it's pkexec conf issue. you need to configure it so that it could use other admin credential.

[Recy]

debian disabled root password by default so solydxk should have exact same behaviour with vanilla debian..

I just installed debian 8, and sudo is disabled and a root password is compulsory at install time. Only root password is used, for all root privileges.

[kurotsugi]

mine was installed using debian 8 using default config except disk partition and I got no root. debian disabled it for good reasons.

there's no point arguing it. you're missing the point. I'm quite sure it's pkexec conf issue. old solydxk iso got root password enabled and there's no differences behaviour between solydxk and debian in terms of pkexec usage.

[Zill]

Recy: From https://wiki.debian.org/Root:

Password

At installation time, you are asked whether you want to use the root account or not.

If you want to (the default), you'll be asked to provide a complex password for root. Use a strong one!
If not, no root account is enabled and the password of the first user created will be used for administration tasks.

From https://wiki.debian.org/sudo:

Why sudo?

Using sudo is better (safer) than opening a session as root for a number of reasons, including:

Nobody needs to know the root password (sudo prompts for the current user's password). Extra privileges can be granted to individual users temporarily, and then taken away without the need for a password change.
It's easy to run only the commands that require special privileges via sudo; the rest of the time, you work as an unprivileged user, which reduces the damage that mistakes can cause.
Auditing/logging: when a sudo command is executed, the original username and the command are logged.

[Recy]

Well somebody disagrees with whomever wrote that about sudo, if you install from the official live images. Fedora, and many other distros also use root by default. I think they know what they're doing.

And you're right arguing about which is better is not the point, nor what was asked.