[DONE] root password to authorize updates etc.

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[DONE] root password to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Aug 19th, '14, 05:11

Supplying root password in a terminal works, but is rejected in the dialogs that pop up for package installation or updates or Control-Center

Some of the polkit.subject.pid & polkit.caller.pid pairs are

8877/8878, 9011/9012, 9164/9167

The problem has come up on the 5th or 6th boot following some additional package downloads/installs
Last edited by doktor5000 on Sep 8th, '14, 21:28, edited 3 times in total.
Reason: marked thread [DONE]
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby filip » Aug 19th, '14, 08:31

What about user password on usual updates? I sometimes forget that too and type the root one ;).
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby benmc » Aug 19th, '14, 09:49

hi

the lastest round of updates seems to have fixed that issue here.

try, in terminal, as root : " urpmi --auto-update "
you may have to run 2-3 times to get all updates.

regards
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Aug 20th, '14, 05:38

I did the cLi updates, nothing changed.

Then I created another user same as in mag5a1 and imported that user's home directory lock stock and barrel into 5a2. This user does not get bounced.

So I deleted the earlier user ("dummy" with password "dummy") and home directory before recreating exactly the same. Still not allowed to use ControlCenter.

This user can only launch it from cLi as root providing the root password, the other one can launch providing own password (as prompted by 'authenticate') or as root and then providing the root password.
UFN and especially for a few months while I try to adapt/adopt Mageia, my skunkworks involve:
http://www.trixtar.org/3/compuke/My-4-Nix/my4linux.html
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby jacksilver » Aug 25th, '14, 14:35

Same problem here. I can su{,do} to root but i cannot use root password to authorize graphical application. In .xsession-erros, I get

Listener adapter polkit_qt_listener_initiate_authentication
GSimpleAsyncResult: 0x1541420
polkit_qt_listener_initiate_authentication callback for 0x126c620

(process:9520): GLib-GObject-CRITICAL **: g_object_unref: assertion 'G_IS_OBJECT (object)' failed
REQUEST
polkit-agent-helper-1: pam_authenticate failed: Authentication failure
COMPLETED
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Aug 25th, '14, 15:58

I don't really know if this polkit be the culprit but it seems related to a lot of problems in other distros as well, KDE has also been ignoring /etc/sudoers for a long time. My 2 cents says that if someone wants extra perms somewhere they should try the classical approach BUT even if they do not
Code: Select all
/etc/sudoers
should in any event be the foundation that is impossible to override! If I as user have unrestricetd mount privileges then I never ever want to see my attempts barked at by uninvited but(t)-ler-ware. Geeeeeeeeeez, sometimes I even find myself refused as root!
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby jacksilver » Aug 25th, '14, 16:44

I just found that removing my user from the wheel group allowed the UI to work again. Now I need to figure out another way to sudo without a password ...
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Aug 25th, '14, 17:30

I don't get it, did you include yourself in any new group or just bail out of one of several? The latter case would imply inclusionary blacklisting i.e. you get nixed if you do belong to some group, wouldn't make any sense :o

Maybe just the act of changing config forced a rerun of some housekeeping script which put the wrong to right.
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby jacksilver » Aug 25th, '14, 17:49

I just added my user 'jack' to the wheel group using gpasswd, nothing else. After removing this user from the wheel group, UI works again. I don't know why ...
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby doktor5000 » Aug 25th, '14, 20:18

This was discussed previously in viewtopic.php?f=7&t=6969
If you add yourself to the wheel group, you should provide your user password to polkit agents instead of root password. Similar to desktop_admin group in Fedora/RHEL.

@badsector: If you don't understand and/or learn the tools you're using, and workaround security mechanisms, then complain about something breaking or not working properly, it's not the fault of the tools. polkit works just fine and has a sound design. Much better then using sudo direct root login for such tasks.
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Aug 25th, '14, 23:42

I'm not using any tools, that would presume that I picked one up. What I'm talking about is an inadequate interface dialog. It could well be that my original post dealt with an authentication incident and not the requirement to provide ROOT password, if that were the case it would still do nothing to change the nature of the problem which is an issue of ambiguity caused by inadequate communications ..unless a brand new Linux novice having just installed it for the firs time minutes earlier would be expected to know the subtle and definitely even between experts arguable difference between authorizaton and authentication or much worse any polkit notions. Anyway since nothing and no-one in Linux is supposed to (last I heard) overrule root, why not just make the unexpected (because nothing specific was requested) entry of the root password always count for as good or better than any other solicited password?
UFN and especially for a few months while I try to adapt/adopt Mageia, my skunkworks involve:
http://www.trixtar.org/3/compuke/My-4-Nix/my4linux.html
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby jacksilver » Aug 26th, '14, 03:30

@doktor5000 : thank you very much. Everything works well now :)
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby doktor5000 » Aug 26th, '14, 20:06

badsector wrote:I'm not using any tools, that would presume that I picked one up.

You don't seem to understand the authentication at all. Tool in this case means one of the polkit authentication agents, and yes, you're using one of those, as they are installed by default.

badsector wrote:Anyway since nothing and no-one in Linux is supposed to (last I heard) overrule root ...

Wherever you heard that, it is not correct. Root can overrule himself, and there are mechanisms to even restrict root.
Also your proposal to always require root password is probably a really good idea. :roll:
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Re: cannot use root pw to authorize updates etc.

Postby badsector » Sep 7th, '14, 23:27

doktor5000 wrote:
badsector wrote:I'm not using any tools, that would presume that I picked one up.

You don't seem to understand the authentication at all. Tool in this case means one of the polkit authentication agents, and yes, you're using one of those, as they are installed by default.

badsector wrote:Anyway since nothing and no-one in Linux is supposed to (last I heard) overrule root ...

Wherever you heard that, it is not correct. Root can overrule himself, and there are mechanisms to even restrict root.
Also your proposal to always require root password is probably a really good idea. :roll:


The restrictions erected against root are another one of my favorite topics but that's another realm altogether, my attitude begins and ends with 'whose computer is this?'

As for requiring root password for everything, that may or may not be a good idea, I don't claim to have the answer to that but I certainly see no point in a user who has logged-in and has provided a password to have to repeat that again during the session. Regardless, any dialog should be CLEAR about what it's asking for

Supply ROOT password or
Supply password for user SoAndSo or
Supply YOUR user password

If it so happens that the ambiguity arises from some polkit design-inadequacy than the polkit devs should fix it. If it were up to me I simply would not install the polkit package at all.

I repeat that all novices and most users coming face-to-face with the terminology for the first time do NOT know the difference beween authorization and authentication.
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Re: root pw not authorize updates etc.

Postby doktor5000 » Sep 8th, '14, 21:27

You are free to do what you wish.
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Re: [DONE] root password to authorize updates etc.

Postby AlBell » Nov 3rd, '17, 06:07

I had the same (or similar) problem, which made me almost crazy.
But the solution was (in my case) simple: finally i found that the user mageia was locked. I've unlocked it after starting mcc as root from a terminal, and everything is fine now.
I don't know why my authentication agent requests mageia and not root, I probably missed something recently... :mrgreen:
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Re: [DONE] root password to authorize updates etc.

Postby AlBell » Nov 3rd, '17, 06:09

badsector wrote:Supplying root password in a terminal works, but is rejected in the dialogs that pop up for package installation or updates or Control-Center

I had the same (or similar) problem, which made me almost crazy.
But the solution was (in my case) simple: finally i found that the user mageia was locked. I've unlocked it after starting mcc as root from a terminal, and everything is fine now.
I don't know why my authentication agent requests mageia and not root, I probably missed something recently... :mrgreen:
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