[SOLVED] fail to get sudo to work

kiyoshi77 · 06-03-2022, 10:32 AM

Hi, I am trying to get sudo to work on my machine, but I keep getting the following message when ever I try to use sudo: "userName is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported". how ever userName is in the sudoers file. Here are the steps I took to add my user to sudo

groupadd usrName sudo
nano /etc/group check that sudo:x:1000:usrName
nano /etc/sudoers uncomment %sudo ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL
nano /etc/profile set sys path to "/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/sbin:/sbin"
reboot
test sudo

Is there another step I am missing to enable sudo. As a side note after I enable sudo I'll like to limit how much I can do with sudo but first I need to ge the basics to work. I am used to archlinux and I want to switch to slackware because I am tired of the 'rolling updates' and want something more stable.

Moderator, if you want you can delete this tread. right after posting I looked in my group file and saw this line usrName:x:1000: and I deleted it. now sudo is working

brianL · 06-03-2022, 10:50 AM

Just mark it as "Solved" using the Thread Tools drop-down menu.

brianL · 06-03-2022, 10:50 AM

Just mark it as "Solved" using the Thread Tools drop-down menu.

SpacePlod · 06-03-2022, 10:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kiyoshi77

4. nano /etc/profile set sys path to "/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/sbin:/sbin"

One note on this: rather than editing the system-wide path it's probably better to have your sudo path set within sudo itself. Check out these lines in sudoers:

Code:

## Uncomment to use a hard-coded PATH instead of the user's to find commands
Defaults secure_path="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin"

enorbet · 06-03-2022, 10:57 AM

Just use "su" instead. I dislike "sudo" because it has cleared the path for many "modern" distros to not even setup a root account and deny running many apps as root. I love CLI and commonly do not boot directly to X11 but when editing most config files I prefer using a Super User File Manager that will launch a root level editor as I need it and give me a split screen so I can do compares all in one place and visually.

pan64 · 06-03-2022, 11:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kiyoshi77

groupadd usrName sudo # ok
nano /etc/group check that sudo:x:1000:usrName # ok
nano /etc/sudoers uncomment %sudo ALL=(ALL:ALL) ALL # not a good idea
nano /etc/profile set sys path to "/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/sbin:/sbin" # why do you need this?
reboot
test sudo

Is there another step I am missing to enable sudo. As a side note after I enable sudo I'll like to limit how much I can do with sudo but first I need to ge the basics to work. I am used to archlinux and I want to switch to slackware because I am tired of the 'rolling updates' and want something more stable.

Yes, you need to remove that ALL= line and allow only what is really required. This is just a security hole.

frankbell · 06-03-2022, 08:14 PM

I agree heartily with enorbet about sudo.

Sudo was created to give limited, specific administrative rights to persons who needed them to fulfill their responsibilities, not to be a substitute for root.

bassmadrigal · 06-03-2022, 09:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by enorbet

Just use "su" instead. I dislike "sudo" because it has cleared the path for many "modern" distros to not even setup a root account and deny running many apps as root. I love CLI and commonly do not boot directly to X11 but when editing most config files I prefer using a Super User File Manager that will launch a root level editor as I need it and give me a split screen so I can do compares all in one place and visually.

Eh, to each their own. I use sudo on one-off commands requiring root. If I'm doing several tasks as root, I'll su.

Either way I think almost everyone can agree that using sudo or su is better than running everything as root