On Sun, Aug 13, 2006 at 20:15:23 +0200, Lubos Vrbka wrote: > hi, > > >>>xauth -f /home/user/.Xauthority extract - $DISPLAY | xauth merge - > >>> > >>>where "user" is the user that logged on to xdm. This will extract the > >>>user's authorization cookie for the current display and merge it into > >>>root's authority file. Then root should be able to access the display > >>>until user logs out again. (I tested this with kdm, but I assume it > >>>works for xdm as well.) > >>ok, this works. after su, i enter this command and then X apps work > >>again. is there any way how this could be 'automated'? > > > >You can put the command into /root/.bashrc, then it is executed whenever > >you do "su". > that's true, however is there any way how to get the information which > user is running the current X session? since it is needed for the xauth > command... with single user machines this is not problem, but with > machines shared by many people...
You could use the information in /var/log/auth.log. With kdm you get an entry like this for every log-on: Aug 13 18:09:23 localhost kdm: :0[5049]: (pam_unix) session opened for user florian by (uid=0) Assuming that xdm and gdm produce similar messages, the following should work: XUSER=$(awk '/[xkg]dm.*opened/{print $12}' /var/log/auth.log | tail -n 1) xauth -f /home/$XUSER/.Xauthority extract - $DISPLAY | xauth merge - I am not sure about the security implications of what you want to do, though. If you use su in an X session that was started by somebody else, then I would be worried that the other user might be able to grab the keyboard beforehand and capture the root password as you type it. -- Regards, Florian -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]