Gaining root access in KDE

d-katz · 02-26-2004, 06:14 AM

Hi,

Is there any way i can get root priviliges while staying in KDE?

I often get a "not enough priviliges" message while trying to edit something
(e.g. an Icon of a mounted device).

Thanks.

Hangdog42 · 02-26-2004, 07:29 AM

You should be able to get root privileges. In a console, type su and then root's password when prompted. After that, all commands in that console will be run as root. If you need to run graphical programs, you probably need to allow root to access your screen, so before you su, you need to issue xhost localhost.

d-katz · 02-26-2004, 08:20 AM

Thanks for the answer, but that did not solve my problem.

after entering 'xhost localhost' and then logging in as root i still get the
following message in KDE when i try to (for example) change the icon of a mounted
drive:

Could not save properties. You do not have sufficient access to write to /home/davidk/Desktop/win_c2/.directory.

Any ideas on how to handle this?

Thanks.

Hangdog42 · 02-26-2004, 09:12 AM

A couple of questions:

Is /home/davidk/Desktop/win_c2/.directory a NTFS directory? What I mean, is have you mounted a Windows directory at this location?

What are the actual permission on /home/davidk/Desktop/win_c2/.directory? You should be able to find this with ls -l.

Finally, once you've become su, you might want to check your identity with whoami just to make sure you are root.

bitpicker · 02-26-2004, 09:14 AM

In a graphical environment you can use gnomesu to have graphical applications run as root.

Robin

d-katz · 02-26-2004, 09:26 AM

Thanks Gary and Robin...

The answers are:

1. yes, this is a location where i've mounted an NTFS drive
2. ls -l shows 'root' on all files
3. when i 'su' i see 'root' after typing 'whoami'

Robin, what is gnomesu and how do I use it?

Thanks a lot,

bitpicker · 02-26-2004, 09:38 AM

You can't normally write to an NTFS drive AFAIK. Writing access to NTFS is still not usable.

Gnome SU is a graphical SU command for the Gnome desktop. You'll have to google for it, I don't recall exactly where I got it. There may be RPMs or whatever you need for your distribution.

Robin

Hangdog42 · 02-26-2004, 10:06 AM

Quote:

yes, this is a location where i've mounted an NTFS drive

Bitpicker has it right. You can't write to an NTFS drive. Well, that's not entirely true....you can't safely write to an NTFS drive. In the 2.6.x kernels, you can compile in the ability to write NTFS drives, but there are a ton of warnings that doing so may wipe out your NTFS partition.

So your problem isn't with root access, its with NTFS

d-katz · 02-26-2004, 06:29 PM

I see...

but is there no way to create a link on my desktop (like a windows shortcut) and just change the icon of the link without having anything to do with the drive?

Thanks,

bitpicker · 02-27-2004, 05:46 AM

Normally you should be able to do that. The icon set can be managed with kcontrol, and you can also change the icon from the context menu (Properties). If you can't, maybe for some reason you do not have access to your own desktop folder. You'll have to check the permissions on that folder and its files, and reset them if necessary.

Robin