How do you disable root's ability to login to slackware? Like in ubuntu. I find myself forgetting I'm root and doing bad things all the time, and it would be easier just to force myself to use sudo.

I suppose if you really wanted to do that, you could do:

chsh -s /bin/false root

Thanks for the quick response.

You could always add

PermitRootLogin no

to /etc/ssh/sshd_config and disable root's ability to login via ssh. It's a security plus and it makes you use 'su'. However root can still login on the box itself.

I'd think changing root's shell would break a lot of things though?

It does sound like it could break some stuff now that I think about it. That was just the first way I thought of.

Yeah.. umm it does break things.. Just after five minutes I've noticed some issues, with package management mostly.

Thanks for your ssh tip, but I don't have SSHd starting automatically, this is a laptop.

I think that how Ubuntu does it is to disable the root account. You can use the passwd command to do it. "sudo passwd -l root" to lock out root, and "sudo passwd -u root" to unlock it. The effect will be to add a "!" character in front of the /etc/shadow encrypted password field.

You will want to make sure that you can log into single mode, or using a rescue disk, in case this causes problems and you need to be root to change back. I tested this with a dummy user account but not with the root account while composing this post.

Also, edit your /etc/sudoers file using "visudo" to grant yourself permission to run root commands using sudo. Making yourself a member of the "wheel" group and uncommenting the line for %wheel in visudo is the way it usually is done. ( You probably have already done this. )

The sshd_config tip is a good one, and I would do it anyway, in case you decide to use it in the future and enable sshd temporarily. I would also recommend adding your user name to "AllowUsers" and uncommenting that entry. This way, a hacker would only be successful by guessing both your username and password.

I could be wrong, but doesnt the 'sudo' in Ubuntu time out after 15 minutes or so.

So in theory if he get's rid of root, the does sudo once, wouldnt every thing he does for now on be as root and effectively get himself into trouble?

i have tried like giving a certain user that can do the command su but unfortunately i forgot how i did it. is there someone who can refresh my memories? thanks.