Is there a graphical sudo (kdesudo, gksudo, su-to-root, ...) tool that works passwordless?

Question

Apparently gksudo is not obeying /etc/sudoers, neither does kdesu.

Therefore asking the other way around...

Is there any su-to-root, gksudo, kdesudo, etc. alike tool, that supports starting gui applications as root or different user with an option to skip entering a password?

You should be able to do it with pkexec if polkit is installed on your system. — don_crissti, Dec 14 '14 at 19:14

score 5 · Answer 1 · edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:36

5

The point of a “graphical sudo” is to prompt for the user's password. If you don't want a password prompt, use plain sudo.

Run visudo to create an entry in the sudoers file with the NOPASSWD tag. Note that this entry must come after any ALL entry.

Make sure that the DISPLAY and XAUTHORITY environment variables are preserved, to allow running X11 applications.

adrelanos ALL = (ALL) ALL
adrelanos ALL = (root) NOPASSWD: my-x11-application-to-run-as-root
Defaults env_keep += "DISPLAY HOME XAUTHORITY"

edited Apr 13 '17 at 12:36

Community

1

answered Dec 14 '14 at 22:52

Gilles 'SO- stop being evil'

829,060

$XAUTHORITY is empty on my system (openSUSE 13.2, konsole). – Hauke Laging Dec 14 '14 at 23:54
@HaukeLaging If XAUTHORITY is not set, ~/.Xauthority is used. Good point though: HOME needs to be preserved in that case. – Gilles 'SO- stop being evil' Dec 14 '14 at 23:56

Hauke Laging · Answer 2 · 2014-12-14T19:53:57.957

1

You can use SSH with X forwarding (-X) and a key without password.

SSH has the useful feature that keys can be limited to one command. This could be a kind of sudo replacement: Prevent the user from doing as root what he wants; limit him to what he must be capable of doing.

edited Dec 14 '14 at 19:53

answered Dec 14 '14 at 19:07

Hauke Laging

90,279

1

Sounds like overkill for a local system. Nothing simpler? – adrelanos Dec 14 '14 at 19:11

Is there a graphical sudo (kdesudo, gksudo, su-to-root, ...) tool that works passwordless?

2 Answers2