I installed mandrake with "very high security" setup and as a server .

I don't know if that has anything to do with the fact that I can't find anywhere on my desktop or on the graphic login screen something that will shut down the computer and I have to log from a terminal to use the init 6 command.

Also , when I try to log from a terminal using the root user it doesn't let me and I have to log as a regular user and use the su command.

And one more thing, I can't see any user names on the logon screen to the graphic mode.

It is considered a security risk to allow a regular user to power down a server with high security.

It is also a security risk to allow a graphical log-in to root.

Finally, go into the KDE control panel, System - Login Manager. Choose Users tab, and here you can decide which users are no-show etc.

hi!like oarlywarly said it is for security purpuses and you shouldn't login as root!but if you insist you can create kfm with right of root and then you can enter the file manager as normal user (sure you need root password)another good thing webmin try that instead

so is it ok to shutdown the computer with the init 6 command ?

I don't cause any damage to my computer when I do that ?

should I log out the graphic mode before doing that ?

another problem is that I can't login as root not to the graphic mode but to the shell. I have to use one of my users account and only than to use the su command , change to the root user and logout or anything else.

is it normal ?

Your 'very high' security setting is defined by an optional mandrake program called msec. I do not use msec so cannot say whether this is 'normal', but it is reasonable.

You should not find this to be an inconvenience. Logging in as root is a bad habit.

When the graphic log in asks for a user try typing in the word root instead of a user.

But yes logging in as root is a bad security risk and running the GUI as root is even worse. With just one wrong click you could open your system to the whole of the net. Or at least you could remove whole sections of code that the system needs to even load and run.

Linux is not windows and will not ask the root administrator three times if he wants to remove any part of the OS. It just assumes he knows what hes doing and does it.

having your system security up that high is really not nessesary unless you are setting up a local network and will have untrusted people on the system. Like little siblings who might just turn it on and start removing what they don't know. Mine is a single user desktop system and I only have it set at standard. On the net 24/7 and never had a problem. Ever.

What I am trying to say is that my problem to log in as root is not in the graphic mode. it works there just fine.
The problem is from shell, the black screen with the command line.....

I have the same issue.

My question: Is there a way to initiate a command as ROOT from the command line as another user logged in?

This is to avoid logging in as Root and messing something up as a novice/beginner linux user. Setting up Drake9.2 as a internal web server / FTP server with hopes to open up to internet for minimal personal access.

thanks

I responded to just this problem. As I said, if you find this inconvenient, you have developed a bad habit. Do not log into the shell as root. Log in as a user, then use the su - command.

Logging in as root in 'graphic mode' is an even worse habit. Don't do it! It is unnecessary, dangerous, and inconvenient. Always log in as a user. You can always open a terminal and enter the su - command. If you need to run a graphical application as root, start it from a terminal after doing su -.

If you're having specific problems figuring out how to do something without logging in as root, ask here.

su -c command

Thanks Mac_phil

Excellent Info.

First, thanks for replying.
Second, I know it's a bad habit and I do not usually do that. I only need to login as root when I want to reboot my computer.
Since I have high security setting, I can't boot from the graphic mode, so I close the graphic mode and shell to boot. In this case I know that I have to be root in order to issue the init command so I want to login as root instead of login as user and than su.
So my question is, do I have a bug here or should it be like that ? Is it ok that I can't login as root and have to login as user and use the su command?

Hi have my computer on one of the higher security settings, and to re-boot I run the command:
halt

I'm not saying that's a good idea, but it's what I do and it seems to work!

Hi,

The issues you have with the "very high" security setting sounds very reasonably to me, so that's nothing to worry about. Try out "paranoid", and you'll have a computer that won't allow you to do anything

Some other comments...

Instead of init #, where # is 0 or 6, check out halt, poweroff, reboot, or shutdown. shutdown will need some options, for instance -h now, or -r now.

Use su - instead of su, to make the shell a login shell - that will give you root's paths and settings as well.

It is a good habit to unable root to log in directly, like the "very high" security level in Mandrake does. For your information, /etc/securetty contains the device names of tty lines (one per line, # without leading /dev/) on which root is allowed to login (OK, I'm paraphrasing ). For instance, put "tty1" (without quotes) on a line if you want to be able to login as root in the first tty (the one you access with Ctrl+Alt+F1).

Cheers