Check root access in Ruby

Penguin of Wonder · 07-24-2007, 01:32 PM

I'm using Ruby to write a fairly simple script but the script needs root access to run properly. Is there a simple method to check if the user is root in Ruby. I know how to in Bash and I've found easy enough examples for Perl, but a method Ruby evades me.

Any suggestions?

taylor_venable · 07-25-2007, 07:03 PM

You can see the environment with the following Ruby snippet:

Code:

ENV.each do |key,value| puts "#{key} = #{value}"; end

You'll see there are entries for "USER" and "USERNAME" -- the former is the one you'll want to check for the sake of confirming permissions. If the script is run through sudo, "USER" will be the sudo-ed-to user (usually root) and "USERNAME" will be the user who ran sudo. (Of course, sudo sets other environment variables, but I presume that "USERNAME" would reveal the original UID of other programs that change permissions during the course of execution as well.)

Oh, also, ENV is a hash, in case that wasn't apparent. ENV["USER"] gets the value.

Penguin of Wonder · 07-25-2007, 09:04 PM

Thank you very much! I'm in the process of learning ruby so I have some reading to do to fully understand it. But you have at least set me on the right track and thats what I really needed. Again, thank you.