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On Sun, Feb 28, 2010 at 11:55 AM, Mike Auty <ikelos@g.o> wrote: |
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> Hiya William, |
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> Sudo can be used to restrict access, so that only certain programs can |
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> be run using it. It asks for your password rather than the user you're |
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> trying to login to (unlike su). It also helps maintain a more accurate |
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> audit trail (although I don't have details on exactly how it does that). |
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> Also su I believe only allows access to people in the wheel group. |
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> Therefore, you'll see people using them in conjunction (particularly |
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> with systems like ubuntu that don't give you a root user), so that a |
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> user can enter their own password and be restricted to a particular |
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> program in this case su, and keep better audit logs all thanks to sudo. |
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> Whilst at the same time it still gives you complete access to the |
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> system/login shell through su (a simpler and therefore presumably easier |
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> to secure program). So they can achieve the same results, but it is the |
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> differences in the programs and the way they work that makes people |
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> choose one over the other (or try and combine their best qualities). |
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I think William's question is specific to invocations of 'sudo su -' |
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and that 'sudo -s' and 'sudo -i' provide similar results with 1 less |
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exec. The security of sudo does not help here; both leave you with a |
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root shell and 0 auditing of commands in that shell by default (unless |
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root's shell is a audited shell; some places use them). I think the |
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answer to William's question is 'not everyone knows about sudo -s or |
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sudo -i.' I used Linux for years before sudo -s became normal usage |
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for me (sudo bash and sudo su before that) and I assume a number of |
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users are in a similar position. They found something that works so |
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they used that to get root with their password. |
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> That's the best of my understanding, hope it helps? |
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> Mike 5:) |
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