Today I tried to log in as "su" and I got this "Permission denied" error message. I made sure I was typing my password in correctly, but I still got this message. I tried changing my user account from "custom" to "administrator" but the problem persists.

There's only two things I can think of that may have caused this. First I did updates a few days ago, but I've used "su" since then without any issues. Second I added my user to the group vmware. Other than that though those are the only administrative changes I've made to my system. Oh, I did install VMware, also.

What can I do to fix this? All I can think of is creating a new user account and moving my files.

A strange detail of this is I can still log in as administrator via the GUI. I just can't log in via the Terminal.

I'm using Sabayon 8 with Gnome 3.2.

did you check what /var/log/secure is showing ???

I'm confused by the statement "logging in as su". I think you might mean that you are using su (command meaning "switch user") to log in as root..

try this: enter ctrl-alt-F1 to get a command prompt, and try to log in as root. (and "administrator", if root does not work)

Depending on how your system is set up, there might also be an account named "administrator". to check, open a terminal and enter "cat /etc/passwd". Post the results here.

1 members found this post helpful.

Sorry, yes, I'm using "su" to log in as root (I always thought su meant super user?)

I can't check my logs. I have to be logged in as an admin to do that.

"adm" looks like it might be the administrator account.


jonquil@sabayon ~ $ cat /etc/passwd
root:$6$T8TDaSyEwZ84MEuJ$OcD3zw30h9ttiIx8xZ0ahsy8bFOuVJliasVCt3C9WwmlXPEtMGrgEmaOvtAAEFqqEImtOtwJ5vz YvwjfeKtqA/:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/bin/false
daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/bin/false
adm:x:3:4:adm:/var/adm:/bin/false
lp:x:4:7:lp:/var/spool/lpd:/bin/false
sync:x:5:0:sync:/sbin:/bin/sync
shutdown:x:6:0:shutdown:/sbin:/sbin/shutdown
halt:x:7:0:halt:/sbin:/sbin/halt
mail:x:8:12:mail:/var/spool/mail:/bin/false
news:x:9:13:news:/usr/lib/news:/bin/false
uucp:x:10:14:uucp:/var/spool/uucppublic:/bin/false
operator:x:11:0perator:/root:/bin/bash
man:x:13:15:man:/usr/man:/bin/false
postmaster:x:14:12ostmaster:/var/spool/mail:/bin/false
cron:x:16:16:cron:/var/spool/cron:/bin/false
ftp:x:21:21::/home/ftp:/bin/false
sshd:x:22:22:sshd:/dev/null:/bin/false
at:x:25:25:at:/var/spool/cron/atjobs:/bin/false
xfs:x:33:33:X Font Server:/etc/X11/fs:/bin/false
postfix:x:207:207ostfix:/var/spool/postfix:/bin/false
portage:x:250:250ortage:/var/tmp/portage:/bin/false
guest:x:405:100:guest:/dev/null:/dev/null
nobody:x:65534:65534:nobody:/:/bin/false
dhcp:x:101:407:added by portage for dhcp:/var/lib/dhcp:/bin/false
messagebus:x:103:410:added by portage for dbus:/dev/null:/bin/false
ldap:x:439:439:added by portage for openldap:/usr/lib/openldap:/dev/null
rpc:x:111:111:added by portage for portmap:/dev/null:/bin/false
avahi:x:110:445:added by portage for avahi:/dev/null:/usr/sbin/nologin
polkituser:x:126:1019:added by portage for policykit:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
avahi-autoipd:x:127:1021:added by portage for avahi:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
entropy-nopriv:x:109:452:added by portage for entropy:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
pcscd:x:102:105:added by portage for pcsc-lite:/var/run/pcscd:/sbin/nologin
dnsmasq:x:104:103:added by portage for dnsmasq:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
pulse:x:105:101:added by portage for pulseaudio:/var/run/pulse:/sbin/nologin
colord:x:106:999:added by portage for colord:/var/lib/colord:/sbin/nologin
ntp:x:123:123:added by portage for ntp:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
vboxguest:x:107:998:added by portage for virtualbox-guest-additions:/var/run/vboxguest:/bin/sh
usbmux:x:108:85:added by portage for usbmuxd:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
hsqldb:x:112:997:added by portage for hsqldb:/dev/null:/bin/sh
mysql:x:60:60:added by portage for mysql:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
transmission:x:113:996:added by portage for transmission-base:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
games:x:36:35:added by portage for gnome-games:/usr/games:/bin/bash
gdm:x:114:994:added by portage for gdm:/var/lib/gdm:/sbin/nologin
openvpn:x:115:993:added by portage for openvpn:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin
sabayonmce:x:116:100:added by portage for sabayon-mce:/var/sabayonmce:/bin/sh
jonquil:x:1000:1001:Jonquil McDaniel:/home/jonquil:/bin/bash
clamav:x:117:992:added by portage for clamav:/dev/null:/sbin/nologin

This is what happens when I try "login"


jonquil@sabayon ~ $ login
login: Cannot possibly work without effective root

Shouldn't it prompt for a username?

I rebooted and now I can't access my package manager, either. It prompts for the administrator password, I type it in, and then the prompt disappears and my package manager never starts.

Ok so we were both right about "su".

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...6/#post2667972

It turns out I somehow got deleted from the group "wheel", which evidently gives me administrator access.

gpasswd -a yourUserName wheel

That's the command I used to add myself back to the group. Thank you for your time and patience, this is now solved!