On Sun, Apr 29, 2012 at 10:20 PM, Jeff Jensen <jjensen at apache.org> wrote: > By using a root >> prompt, you expose yourself to far too many risks and lose out on >> several very nice benefits that one gains by using sudo. > > > What are they? > One of the nicer benefits is that everything is logged. Though, of course, if your logs are on the machine and you get owned and the hacker zaps your log files, that didn't do you much good, which is why it's good to redirect syslog to a hardened log server. But for home use that's a bit overkill, and in small shops too, it's unlikely someone will go to that much effort. > Are this thread's recommendations even for my home servers, or is this > more for the shared server environment, a la corporate? > > Well, I'm usually operating in one of two modes. Generally working on my own stuff, or administering the system. If I'm administering the system, I will actually work off of a root prompt. Sometiems my root sessions use a color for the text that I only ever use in root sessions. So I have a very obvious "You are root" flag in my face as I type. When I'm done I shut them down, but if I'm crawling over log files, configuration files, restarting services, etc... throwing sudo in front of everything is a pain. I would say root shells are okay - but don't leave them laying around. When you're done, shut them down. If you use VNC and someone hijacks your vnc session and you have a root shell open - you just compounded a bad situation. -Rob -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://mailman.mn-linux.org/pipermail/tclug-list/attachments/20120429/54fa0dcd/attachment.html>