So it turned out that some more fixes are required in applets that call one of the g-s-t tools. They have to be changed to run that tool through gksudo.
First, clock-applet (from gnome-panel). The command string is fed through g_shell_parse_argv(), thus the simple string change works. This has been tested on edgy and feisty. ** Attachment added: "gnome-panel debdiff for edgy-proposed" http://librarian.launchpad.net/5248945/gnome-panel.edgy.diff -- Admin tools require admin group membership https://launchpad.net/bugs/59946 -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs