--- "D.Venkatasubramanian, Noida" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> the prompt, give the command : > su - root > The system will prompt for a password (the root password) > If the password is correct, you are then logged in as superuser. > So, you can > do everything here without jeopardising the whole system. As far as > you are > concerned, you are superuser only from that shell. Everything else, > runs as > normal user. > IMHO, this is the better approach. [EMAIL PROTECTED] The root account is not to be used for normal day to day work. There are no restrictions on root. He or she can read, modify, or delete any file on the system, change permissions and ownerships on any file, and run special programs like those which partition a hard drive or create file systems. The basic idea is that a person who cares for the system logs in as root to perform tasks that cannot be executed as a normal user. Because root can do anything, it is easy to make mistakes that have catastrophic consequences. If a normal user tries inadvertently to delete all of the files in /etc, the system will not permit him or her to do so. However, if root tries to do the same thing, the system doesn't complain at all. It is very easy to trash a GNU/Linux system when using root. If the operating system does not allow you to read/write a file, then check whether `you' really, really, really need to modify that file before logging in as root and modifying it. If you want to learn more about `File Permissions' see the very excellent book `Linux Installation and Getting Started' on http://www.tldp.org or search for it using Google . It has a section `Linux Tutorial' which has a subsection `File permissions'. http://tldp.org/LDP/gs/node5.html#SECTION005100000000000000000 Regards Raj Shekhar ===== Give credit where credit is due. Linux is just the kernel. Without the efforts of people involved with the GNU project the Linux kernel would not be very useful to most people.See http://www.gnu.org/gnu/linux-and-gnu.html to know more ________________________________________________________________________ Missed your favourite TV serial last night? Try the new, Yahoo! TV. visit http://in.tv.yahoo.com ================================================ To unsubscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with unsubscribe in subject header. Check archives at http://www.mail-archive.com/ilugd%40wpaa.org
