
You can ask any questions or share your thoughts via the comment section below. We hope you find this article informative.
#Sudo vs su vs sudo su how to#
You will also land into root’s home directory: $ suĪlso check out: How to Show Asterisks While Typing Sudo Password in Linux You will be given root’s default environment, including path to executable files changes. Importantly, when you run su without a username, you will automatically become the superuser. You can also add persist after permit so that you do not have to re-type.

If you need to set up different permissions for 100 people just use sudo. you use it on your home computer where you are probably the only user. In this case, the user tecmint is provided his own default login environment, including path to executable files he also lands into his default home directory. Doas is easier to set up if you are the intended user, i.e. All the commands below are equivalent to each other. Secondly, when you invoke su with a -, or -l or -login flags, it offers you a login interface similar to when you are logging on normally. : Permission denied” is displayed.īut at the end, user tecmint can list his home directory after running cd command without any options. When used with the -i option, sudo run an interactive. Running sudo su - and then typing the user password has the same effect the same as running su - and typing the root password. If the user is granted with sudo assess, the su command is invoked as root. $ su tecmintĬonsidering the scenario in the screenshot above, it is significant to note that the user tecmint keeps the environment from user aaronkilik’s original login session, the current working directory and the path to executable files also remain the same.Īs a result, when user tecmint tries to list the working directory (which is still user aaronkilik’s working directory), the error: “ ls: cannot open directory. The sudo command allows you to run programs as another user, by default the root user. Theres no added security from the old 'login as non-root, then su or sudo to root' sysadmin 'wisdom', as compared to logging in as non-root and as root directly (two separate sessions). Usually, to become another user or login to other user, you can invoke the following command, then you will be prompted for the password of the user you’re switching to. For servers, I think people need to reconsider and, in most cases, disallow invocation of su and sudo by the users. This article will help you briefly understand the difference between “su” and “su -“ in Linux systems.

If executed without a username, for example su -, it will login as root user by default.Ī common challenge faced by new Linux users is understanding the difference between “su” and “su -“. The su command is used to switch to another user, in other words change user ID during a normal login session (that is why it is sometimes referred to as switch (-) user by a number of Linux users).

These are two important commands used to implement security in Linux, in regards to user management policy and user permissions. In an earlier article, we have explained to you the difference between sudo and su commands in Linux.
