I cant use sudo

**RHCA** · 01-17-2007, 08:40 AM

Hello and Thanx again I have installed the DVD on my HD and it works great dualbotting with win xp, I had to use sudo yesterday and when i try to use sudo in the command line it says RHCA is not in the sudoers list this incident will be reported. RHCA is my username and hostname any ideas?

**nohype** · 01-17-2007, 12:12 PM

Hi RHCA,

I answered your question recently. As root-user you may edit your sudoers-file. That is, please type in at your command-line-prompt:

su -

Then, for the needed change, please look at this thread:

"Super User at Knoppix 5.1.1 HD-installed"

-nohype

**RHCA** · 01-18-2007, 05:15 PM

I dont understand so much what you said I am a little new to linux and i would like you to explain it more

**nohype** · 01-18-2007, 07:35 PM

Hi RHCA,

you may want to edit your "sudoers" file. How to do that:

login as "root" in a console window by typing

$ su -

at the prompt.

Then you can edit (with any text-editor) the text-file "/etc/sudoers" by changing 1 line (by commenting out the line beginning with "knoppix" by a leading "#" - without using the quotation marks) and adding a new line for user "RHCA" - that's YOU - expressing the rights of "RHCA" for executing privileged commands by "sudo".
_______________________
# /etc/sudoers
...
...
# knoppix ALL=NOPASSWD: ALL
RHCA ALL=NOPASSWD: ALL
_______________________

Hth.

-nohype

**RHCA** · 01-19-2007, 05:16 PM

Hello I have already edited the sudoers file bit now when i try to use sudo it says that it is on 660 and it should be on 440 or something like this. Have got any ideas?

**nohype** · 01-19-2007, 06:01 PM

Originally Posted by RHCA

...
sudoers file ... should be on 440 or something like this.
...

This is correct!
Explanation: sudo is the "owner" of "/etc/sudoers" and allows to the owner (=itself) and to group members only read-access-rights to "/etc/sudoers" when executing sudo and forbids all other access-rights.

FYI: file-access-rights are coded like this:

0400 Allow read by owner.
0200 Allow write by owner.
0020 Allow write by group members.
0040 Allow read by group members.

Adding these codes means that access-rights are granted for the individual rights expressed by the unique summands.

So 0660=660 is the unique sum of 0200,0400,0020,0040 with the obvious rights.
But only 0440=440 being the (unique!) sum of 0400 and 0040 are allowed.

So, change these access-rights accordingly with the chmod-command in root-user mode:

$ su -

and then

# chmod 440 /etc/sudoers.

That's it!

Hth
-nohype