Workstations: good reasons for owner root access

[Barry Margolin]

In article <183 at ndc.UUCP> sgf at ndc.UUCP (Fishman) writes:
>I work on a diskless microVAX 2000, so I don't do my own system 
>administration, but I occasionally _must_ have su privledge (sp?).
>That happens when my system must be rebooted, so I have to do a
>shutdown.

Why not just make shutdown setuid root, and executable only by a group
of which you are the sole member?

These are the kinds of tools someone was referring to when he said
that in a well-designed system you should rarely need to use "su".
"su" should only be for unusual circumstances.  Users shutting down
their workstations is not unusual, so there should be a standard tool
for it.

Barry Margolin
Thinking Machines Corp.

barmar at think.com
{uunet,harvard}!think!barmar