Goal: be able to type sudo netpkg auto-install apache to install apache.
First of all you must make sure that you are allowed to use sudo. In /etc/sudoers, add this line:

or, if you want a password to be required:

For most Zenwalk users, this is only a matter of uncommenting (removing the # from the start of) these lines, as they are already there.

Then, you must be a member of group wheel. This is easiest done using userconfig in the XFCE menu, located in the system submenu. Go to list user, find yourself in the list, and add wheel to the comma separated "membership" field.

Now, test your sudo by typing sudo mousepad and take another look at the sudoers file to verify that you're actually running as root (this file can't be read by others by default).

If you try to type sudo netpkg auto-install apache now, it will not find the command netpkg. To solve this, edit the file ~/.bashrc, in other words the file .bashrc in your home directory. At the end of the file, add this line:


Close and open the terminal window. You should now be able to use netpkg together with sudo.

One of the reasons MS Windows is considered less secure than the averag *nix OS is that normal users are not always working as "administrator". What you just did above almost eliminates that benefit.

The effects of what you have done are far wider reaching than just making 'netpkg' availlable. It makes all users in the group 'wheel' able to run any command on any host as any user. So this is not only a breach in the security of the system on which you put this command, but a breach in the security of any unix machine in your network that accepts commands from this host too.

/usr/sbin & /sbin are not in the path of a normal user because the commands in those directories should not be run as a normal user.

And what is the benefit of what you have done? Virtually nothing. Typing this is almost as easy:It's exactly five keystrokes more.

You are free to do on your own system what you want. But the unwary be warned that this is not a good idea.

_____  _____  _____

As a more possitive conclusion. Try:

Where 'myhost' is the name of your computer. Plus your alteration of the PATH (minus :/sbin). This actually does what the title of this thread suggests (and nothing more) in a more safe way.

I know what I did, and if the user has to type a password with sudo it's not that insecure. If you don't want it that way, just don't follow this how-to.

By the way, did you actually test your alternate solution?

Yes.


You might know what you did. But the title of the thread and what you actually did didn't compare. So the unwary new user who reads howto's to learn linux got very bad advice.