Problem logging on as root through terminal

cmarnell · 08-25-2006, 01:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shadowfx78

to do something as root try sudo not just su

ie sudo apt-get update

I am not trying to do something as root, I am trying to "switch user" (su) to root.

I am thinking that the problem has something to do with PAM, but I am not quite sure what.

robgig1088 · 08-25-2006, 11:02 PM

I dont know which distro youre using but in Ubuntu, you type "sudo su" and then the password of the current user. try that.

sdexp · 08-25-2006, 11:06 PM

That would be a quick solution. Also, I'm not used to seeing the hyphen after "su" so maybe it would be better (rather than "su - ") to enter

Code:

su

or

Code:

su root

.

gilead · 08-26-2006, 01:03 AM

It may be a PAM problem. Can you look through your PAM config and see if there's any attempt to do something odd like an LDAP lookup without an LDAP server available.

cmarnell · 08-26-2006, 11:23 AM

Thanks for all the help. I finally figured out what it was yesterday. There was a permissioning error on /bin/su

I had to chmod u+s /bin/su and it now works.

Quote:

Originally Posted by sdexp

Also, I'm not used to seeing the hyphen after "su" so maybe it would be better (rather than "su - ")

I am still new to Linux, but I am pretty sure adding the - after su loads the user's (who you are becoming) environment.

ramram29 · 08-28-2006, 07:27 AM

Make sure that /etc/pam.d/login has the following:

auth required pam_securetty.so

ramram29 · 08-28-2006, 07:42 AM

Look in file /etc/securetty and make sure all the tty? are there as below:

vc/1
vc/2
.
.
vc/11
tty1
tty2
.
.
tty11