One thing I dislike about Ubuntu (password authentication requests)

[Nostoc]

well at least the keyring pasword notifications can be silenced by keeping the keyring password blank. but cant do anything for the terminal sudo commands.

in jaunty one could run it as root, but its not possible in karmic.

You can use a root terminal by typing sudo bash and providing your password.

That's not a good thing to do most of the time though.

[Vaphell]

Gawd, I hate trolls.

All I am saying is, if you are the user of your pc on your own private network, there is no reason you are required to enter passwords all the time. Authentication-by-a-click would suffice.

I think it would be nice to have a easy way to configure it, for example from the installer.

autentication by a click is proven not to work well, because people don't even try to read the confirmation messages and are trained to OK anything that's thrown their way.

Besides you know what would happen if people would be able to give them root or privilege elevation trivial to use at install time? 99% of noobs coming from the windows world would of course grant themselves these powers permanently bacause this is what they know. And there goes the security out the window.

On a forum where responsibility and security are promoted you are asking for a rope to hang yourself and expect people to actually provide you one If you really want to modify your system to be less restrictive you can just use google. After all if you can find the information by yourself and use it in practice to achieve what you want, then probably you know what you are doing and that rope won't squeeze your neck too hard

[lukeiamyourfather]

Gawd, I hate trolls.

All I am saying is, if you are the user of your pc on your own private network, there is no reason you are required to enter passwords all the time. Authentication-by-a-click would suffice.

I think it would be nice to have a easy way to configure it, for example from the installer.

Unfortunately for you, Ubuntu is developed for everyone else. By everyone else I mean people that use the internet and are around other people. If you don't care about security and don't want to be nagged with a password prompt to protect your system then you might like Windows 95.

Sound like a jerk, don't I? I'm actually a nice guy that likes to help people, but this is a dumb thread that comes up in similar forms all the time. Take a few hours to research why Linux is built the way it is and you'd probably be thanking everyone instead of complaining about typing a password.

Aside from the security the password prompt also reminds new users that what they are doing could potentially damage the system. I can assure you this has saved me many times. This is by no means a comprehensive guide but its a good starting place to understand behind the scenes.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RootSudo

If you really want to have Linux do whatever you ask then you can enable the root account and use that all the time instead of a standard user account, though this is not recommended at all and if you do a little research I think you'll agree. Cheers!

[SunnyRabbiera]

Well the OP forgets the main reason why windows still has security issues is because of the lack of passwords for installing apps, instead Vista/7 uses the UAC but its still not foolproof.
I think passwords are a necessary evil.

[lakersforce]

Thanks for all your comments! Here are some feedback:

Well the OP forgets the main reason why windows still has security issues is because of the lack of passwords for installing apps

Not at all. And of course a weak design (and widely used system) is arguable more open for attacks. But in the end it comes down to the users.

If you really want to have Linux do whatever you ask then you can enable the root account and use that all the time instead of a standard user account, though this is not recommended at all and if you do a little research I think you'll agree. Cheers!

I do agree on that. And I would never use my distro that way. God forbid I would ever make a mistake, but if I did I would be screwed not having the added security of authentication.

autentication by a click is proven not to work well, because people don't even try to read the confirmation messages and are trained to OK anything that's thrown their way.

It does not have to be an 'ok' button. It could for example be a big exclamation marks on red background.

99% of noobs coming from the windows world would of course grant themselves these powers permanently bacause this is what they know.

I am not talking about permanently enabling/disabling anything. My idea is to make the ad hoc authentication "keyboard-less".

If you don't want to give your password to use sudo, you can quite easily reconfigure your Ubuntu system to allow that.

I do not want not to give a authentication, or to be logged on to sudo longer, I would like the authentication process to be some what simplified. But I want it to be there!

[doas777]

would you click ok to this message?


in recent studies (small ones, no doubt), more than 50% of people would, particularly if the warning was preceded by one or more other warnings.
http://arstechnica.com/security/news...are-idiots.ars

this is why.

I would also add, that at work we have reconfigured uac to prompt for username and password, since process isolation killed lots of runas functionality in vista (appears to be fixed in win7). as a result, to organize folders in the Allusers\startmenu folder, I have to confirm (by uname/passwd) for creating a folder, renaming one, moving files into it (once to paste, another to delete). now That, is an annoyance.

[lakersforce]

Before anyone says "lakersforce just fundamentally does not understand the unix-like security model" (again), let me be (almost) perfectly clear: it (might/might not) be a trade-off! Better usability for a little bit of security!

Users are idiots(!), but they do not appreciate being treated like one!

I am not a hacker (yet), but sure there must be some way to deny this kind of authentication if it comes from a network connection and only allow it if the computer can confirm it comes from local I/O devices (not sure about the local I/O devices, but the network part sounds feasible.) That way you would still have todays security model when accessing the computer remotely.

In the grand scheme of things nothing would be lost, but some would be gained!

[Barrucadu]

What privileged thing are you doing so frequently that entering your password is a significant irritation?

[slumbergod]

if I was a moderator I'd just remove silly troll threads. Then I'd ban the user who did it. Then I'd go to their house and smash their computer.

[JBAlaska]

If you don't like sudo'ing...just turn it off. If you don't know how to do that in Karmic..I suggest you DO need sudo