Re: Can't use GUI as root
On April 4, 2004 05:47 pm, Paul Johnson wrote:
> Toshiro <toshiro@nettaxi.com> writes:
> > I'm running sid and I can login to root from the console but when I
> > try to startx if fails, the same happens with the graphical login
> > manager. I don't have any problem using a normal user.
> >
> > Anybody know what's the problem?
>
> Problem exists between keyboard and chair. Don't log in as root. Log
> in as a normal user, and use su -m to run things as root. Then you're
> not running *nearly* as much while running as root, less potential to
> screw things up.
Problem exists in condescending replies. It's a perfectly reasonable
question and a reasonable concern. How is a user supposed to know that
they shouldn't log in as root. My system just refuses to display a
graphical desktop if I try to log in as root in kdm. No error message, no
explanation equals usability bug.
And it is useful to log into KDE as root once in a while. For example a
couple weeks ago I installed udev which rendered any terminal emulator in
X useless and I couldn't run kdesu to execute graphical applications as
root. So there was no (easy) way to execute a graphical application as
root without logging in as root which I was prevented from doing with no
explanation. The system should display a warning (a very insistant one if
necessary) but it shouldn't just wordlessly deny a user to login as root.
~leo
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