On Tue, 5 Feb 2008, p.daniels wrote:

> Ubuntu (or any distro that uses the sudo model) makes this very easy. 
> There is no root account by default, and the "do this as root" password 
> is the password of the original user (you). When you make new users, 
> they don't have root access unless you give it to them. I know on Ubuntu 
> when you make a new user, the menu items that require root access don't 
> even appear in their menus.

The note above is mostly answering a question I was going to ask here. 
Isn't that system weakening security a little bit by essentially making 
the root password the same as one of the user passwords?  If someone gets 
the user password, he also gets root permissions and can do what he 
pleases.

Is there really no root account?  On our Ubuntu system there is one:

$ grep ^root /etc/passwd

root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash

Doesn't there have to be a root account if files are to be owned by root?

What is the advantage of sudo over su?  Does it log activity better?

Mike