On Sunday 08 February 2004 15:34, you wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I would like to know how to configure Gnome on RH9 for a specific user:
> * control the menus from the "start menu" (which item will appear in the
> menues)
> * control which application a user can activate (run)
> * require a root password (or a previledged user password) for certain
> applications
>
> I did not find a suitable answer for that on the web.
> Maybe anyone has a lead for me to follow?
> If you think I cannot accomplish that in Gnome environment, please tell me
> which env and how to do it (or where to look for the answer), because I
> don't know any other GUI environments.
>
> Thanks,
> David.
>
David!
Your entire state of mind is so out of touch with how computers work that I
don't even know where my answer should begin. Here is a feeble attempt:
1. The operating system does not, per se, state which applications each user
can run. If a user has running capabilities then he can launch any executable
file. Even an executable file which was derived from consulting some greek
all knowing oracle who can program in binary.
2. The desktop may hide some buttons but this is no guaratee what so ever that
the user wont be able to launch an application. You better look at buttons as
fast ways of doing things and not as "you can/can't" separators. This is not
windows we are talking about.
3. No set of standard desktop applications has been certified as "not allowing
in some strage way to launch a shell" since launching a shell is absolutely
allowed in Linux (and encouraged for that matter).
4. If you take konqueror for example, it will allow you to have a shell
running inside it.
5. The number of ways you could manipulate an application to launch a shell
for you is so numerous that I can't really think of a large GUI application
which I CANT launch a shell from by manipulating it in some way.
6. If this entire concept of yours is some marketing peoples idea for "the
users not touching our system" go back to them and tell them it's a dream.
7. GDM is just the login application and does not control what the user sees
or does not see on his desktop. The user can even login from GDM to a KDE
environment.
Hope this helps in some way.
Cheers,
Mark
BTW: just for the record - the situation in windows is a lot worse since in
most windows distributions the user has installation priveleges on the
machine so he can actually halt the machine (for instance by running an
installation process which removes critical files) or render the machine
unbootable. In Linux he could just launch applications and not hurt anyone
but himself. Quite an improvement.
--
Name: Mark Veltzer
Title: Research and Development, Meta Ltd.
Address: Habikaa 17/3, Kiriat-Sharet, city.holon, Gush-Dan, country.israel
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