su identification

[Thomas Olsen]

On Thursday 24 December 2009 09:35:24 spir wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I'm aware this question is ~ OT, not really kde related, but have no idea
>  where else to post it, and surely many people here know the answer. To
>  install new software (actually, the language Io, for which there seems to
>  be no package), I had to type:
> 
> su -c "sudo make aptget"
> 
> This will not work. I'm asked for a password, then get "su: Authentication
>  failure". Well, this simply cannot be, for I have only one admin password
>  AFAIK and it works fine for sudo and kdesudo. I tried an old password I
>  had long time ago (changed to make it more difficult), in case the one for
>  'su' may have sticked to old times while the one for sudo has changed, but
>  it is not accepted neither.

You write that sudo and kdesudo works for you. This indicates that you are 
using a distro that doesn't use a superuser (root) account, but instead 
automatically gives some extended rights (membership of certain groups) to the 
first added user (*Ubuntu?.
"su" is only used to change to another user and if none is specified this is 
the user "root" (which has no password).

You should instead use:

sudo make aptget


> I take the opportunity to ask about the use of 'su' in a normal user
>  session. Also, is there another way to perform the above action?

Try to read up on the subject with "man su" and "man sudo".

> Denis
> ________________________________
> 
> la vita e estrany
> 
> http://spir.wikidot.com/
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-- 
Best Regards / Med venlig hilsen

Thomas Olsen
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